


Won't Get Fooled Again

by Safiyabat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, F/M, M/M, Psychic Sam, Temporary Character Death - Winchesters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-02
Updated: 2014-12-02
Packaged: 2018-02-27 21:39:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 52,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2707712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Safiyabat/pseuds/Safiyabat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU picking up after "No Rest For The Wicked." When a creature claiming to be an angel comes upon Sam and Ruby in a motel room claiming he can help Sam train to rescue Dean from Hell, Sam agrees to work with the mysterious Castiel. It doesn't hurt that the handsome stranger tells him that his abilities don't damn him and makes him believe that he might be worthy of affection. When Dean is safely alive again, however, things change. Castiel's orders require him to sever ties, leaving Sam adrift as the road to the Apocalypse appears before them. What will Sam do when he begins to realize that angels are not what he believed?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Two huge thank-yous: to my wonderful artist Ibrahil, who is incredibly talented and easy to work with; and to my delightful beta tumblr user parvasilvi who was patient enough to work with me while I tried to make edits on a camping trip.

Sam should have known that he couldn’t stop it. He’d tried so hard, for the full year, but when had that ever gotten him anything? Stanford? Up in smoke. Azazel? Gone, but that had been Dean (of course), for his own reasons and not Sam’s, and not before Dean had damned himself first. Hell, he could go back further. Flagstaff had been great for two weeks, before Dean and Dad had caught up to him and made him (further) regret being born in the first place.

Watching the hellhounds rip into Dean was like having a piece of himself shredded at the same time. He felt each bite, each tear, each severed artery and mauled tendon in his own soul. The one workable plan to avoid this had been rejected by Dean because in his view it would make him “not human,” and well that was the kicker wasn’t it? He was already going to Hell for something not human. When Lilith used her little ray-of-light attack more than half of him had been hoping that it would just obliterate him, wipe him from the universe and leave him with cold oblivion. Of course the universe hated him almost as much as he hated himself and he’d just stood up, grabbed the knife and stabbed down at the body he’d come to associate with Ruby, his ally.

Which left him to bury Dean. He and Bobby drove out to Pontiac, Michigan, which they chose because Dean had lost his virginity there and Sam figured that was about as sentimental a reason as Dean would ever feel. Then he and Bobby parted ways. The older hunter didn’t have to say anything to remind Sam that it was his fault that he’d lost his favorite. If he’d just been good enough, smart enough, strong enough to not get killed by Jake Freaking Talley back at Cold Oak none of this would be happening, and he hadn’t had much use for Sam since finding out about the visions. Good thing he didn’t know about the rest of it then.

After parting ways with Bobby Sam shut off his phone. No one was going to be calling, not anymore. He then prepared a tin Altoids box with the necessary ingredients and made his way to the nearest crossroads, sat back and waited.

He took the precaution of getting good and drunk before burying the thing. After all, he’d seen how the hellhounds had torn through Dean. He was willing to make the sacrifice but there was no real reason why he couldn’t numb up a bit. He didn’t have to wait long. It seemed like he was taking his sweet time while he stood there by the water tower waiting of course, but hindsight would show that it really wasn’t long. The crossroads demon was shorter than he was but that wasn’t exactly difficult. He was handsome. If it weren’t for the whole possession thing Sam would have thought about it, which he supposed was kind of the point – a crossroads demon was supposed to be attractive to the seller after all. Unfortunately for Sam he wasn’t selling. Sam didn’t even try to haggle. He didn’t want time after Dean’s resurrection. He didn’t want to have to face Dean’s suffering in Hell, all because of him. He just wanted what Lilith supposedly wanted – himself strung up in Dean’s place, dead as he ought to be while Dean was spared any further misery. Apparently that couldn’t happen because Lilith had a Plan. Not to say that he didn’t try. He tried arguing, he tried threatening, he even stabbed the asshole through the hand with Ruby’s knife but nothing worked. Nothing quelled the burning within him - the burning need to take Dean’s place, the burning need for revenge, the burning need to stop his brother’s suffering, the burning need to wipe the smirk off the smug bastard’s face as he denied Sam what he needed most.

So Sam staggered back to his motel where Ruby – in a whole new body – found him with two goons. He didn’t fight her; what would be the point? So he could live another day? Please. Only she turned around and stabbed the goons and tried to parade herself around like some kind of freaking savior. He wasn’t having any of it. Running around and possessing people like that – did she forget that he’d been possessed? He told her to let the secretary go or he wasn’t about to work with her and went and found someplace to squat. He honestly didn’t expect to hear from her again. He didn’t think he even wanted to hear from her again. He’d had enough of demons, if they couldn’t give him what he needed.

She proved him wrong. She showed up a few days later in a pretty, dark-haired body with the medical paperwork to prove that the host had been brain-dead before her possession. No soul, no brain activity, no problem, right? And then she’d told him what he so desperately needed to hear. She couldn’t get Dean back but she could teach him to get revenge.

So Sam started learning. It wasn’t easy – it was in fact acutely painful, leaving him with pain in his head that made him long for the skull-splitting migraines that accompanied his visions when they first showed up. That must mean that something was working, right? Or maybe it meant that his brain was actually short-circuiting. He didn’t care. Either way he was getting a result that worked for him.

Ruby’s premise was that just as Ava had been able to summon and control minor demons, Sam had power over demons too. His ability seemed to lean more toward expulsion and destruction than toward summoning, making him an actual weapon. Part of him shied away from the thought. He might be subhuman part-demon garbage but he was still a person damn it. At the same time, what was really left for him? Revenge against Lilith was the only thing that mattered, now that Dean was gone. He might not be able to rescue Dean but he could make sure that she couldn’t hurt anyone else.

The first thing he needed to do was to learn to see, and that was frustrating enough. It wasn’t like he didn’t already have talents in that direction – he could already sometimes see monsters’ true forms, and he could absolutely identify some demons just by instinct. Meg, for example. Ruby. But actually reaching out and mentally touching the essence of the creature, the writhing black (or red) smoke that was all that remained of a damned soul, to actually deliberately identify them – that was something else. Doing it on purpose was a lot like taking a linebacker, handing him a pair of pointe shoes and demanding that he go to town. It hurt, in ways that he couldn’t even describe using parts of his brain that he hadn’t even known he had. His nose bled, gushing like a leaky faucet. That didn’t stop him and Ruby from driving around looking for demons he could mentally card. At least they never seemed to notice that he was checking their IDs, an infernal NSA.

With time, he got better. At least the work helped keep his absolute misery at bay. It never really left him, and eventually Ruby noticed that he wasn’t sleeping properly and wasn’t eating at all. She objected, naturally. “You can’t half-ass this like before, Sam,” she snapped at him. “You’re never going to be able to take her on as a sleep-deprived anorectic.”

He shrugged, because what the hell did his body matter? “I’ve never slept well, Ruby,” he pointed out. “And I’ve never been on the best terms with food either.” For crying out loud his brother had only died a couple of weeks ago. But then again, he probably shouldn’t expect much of her in terms of emotional consideration. She was a demon. She wasn’t here to hold his hand.

Once the headaches from reaching out and touching someone got to be a dull ache he graduated to trying to pull demons out of their hosts and that – well, that sounded so much easier when Ruby said it. His first attempt ended in disaster. He managed to get a mental hold on the smoke and started to pull it out, but the thing just pulled back and laughed at him. “Let me guess, Sam,” he sneered. “Is it like, I don’t know, trying to catch smoke with your bare, fleshy little hands?” Ruby stepped into the devil’s trap to stab the man, killing the host and further proving that Sam couldn’t save a goddamn nickel if he were locked in a cell with no place to spend it.

She tried to console him when they went back to the place where they were squatting, telling him that he’d get better with time both in terms of his abilities and his grief. That hadn’t gone over well. And then suddenly she’d been right on top of him, straddling him and kissing him like there was something there. He’d pushed her away, objecting to the contact but she persisted. And he’d been drunk, washing some pills down with his whiskey because when you’re bleeding from your ears painkillers seem like a good idea and he’d finally given in. It was wrong, he knew that. He didn’t want it, but if it was what she wanted to help him go after Lilith then he guessed it was what he had to do. Besides, it wasn’t as though the body Ruby was riding had anyone else inside it. And it was just his body, which didn’t matter much in the greater scheme of things. He was tainted anyway, what would a little demon sex really hurt? And how long had it been, anyway, since someone had wanted to put their hands on him for any reason? Damn it, even Dean hadn’t wanted to get near him once he’d been convinced Sam had come back “wrong.” Maybe the only one who wanted him was a demon, but at least someone wanted to have contact with him. Asking him to keep to himself, to stay aloof from any kind of touch when literally anyone in the world who wanted that could at least have a hand to hold just wasn’t right. It wasn’t right. He’d hate himself even more later, but he could no more stop himself than he could hold back a river.

Later, when he went out in what was blatantly a suicide mission into what even a squid that had been raised in complete isolation could tell had been a trap, Ruby showed up to save him and he turned around and saved her by actually managing his first mental exorcism. It hurt worse than anything he’d ever experienced, including having his spinal cord severed, but he managed it.

For a few weeks after that it got easier. The exorcisms still tore through his brain like bullets but they hurt less each time. Maybe it was something like a callus building up, Sam didn’t know. Eventually even the nosebleeds dried up, and then the headaches went from blinding to just incapacitating to simply draining and then just excruciating. He could work with excruciating.

They settled into a routine of hunts, training and sex. Apparently sex, like French fries, was something that Ruby particularly missed about being human but that wasn’t necessarily unique to her. Meg, too, had enjoyed sex although part of the thrill in her case had been the fact that she’d been using his body against his will. And honestly, sex with Ruby wasn’t exactly a hardship once he got past the fact that she was a demon. Saving one another’s lives got him past the lack of emotional connection. Maybe it wasn’t love, but she was a demon and he was damned so whatever. It was some kind of comfort, it kept him connected to the world and his work instead of letting him wallow in his grief and finding new ways to join his brother in Hell.

The routine changed about five weeks after Dean’s death. He and Ruby were in an actual motel for once – no place fancy but he’d finally given into her importuning about squatting and showers and he had to admit that sometimes a bed was nice. They’d gotten takeout, mostly so she could get fries, and Sam had managed to choke down about a quarter of a sandwich before remembering that Dean couldn’t eat where he was and pushed it aside. They’d screwed and now they lay in a post-coital haze that seemed to be an important part of the experience for Ruby. That part he couldn’t figure out. She wasn’t human, it wasn’t like she needed to sleep or even to really rest, but she liked to lie there like having her head on his chest and his arm around her meant something. Maybe she was doing it for him – to make him feel like he wasn’t a monster, like he wasn’t a freak. Like there was part of him that was still human. Whatever. The place had a television, and they had the thing on for once and were idly watching a documentary about the Black Plague. She laughed. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she scoffed.

“What?”

“Like anyone back in those days would have dressed like that! First of all, no one was that clean. Ever. Secondly, even prostitutes showed less skin than that woman is showing. I mean really, I get that they’re trying to get ratings up and like, get people to want to get educated about this crap but seriously. At least try to show what really happened.”

“Was it the plague that got you, Ruby?” he asked, stroking his fingers through her dark hair.

“Nah. Witch hunters. Charming folk, really. It didn’t stop the plague from getting them in the end, though.” She sneered and opened her generous mouth to say something else, but at that moment Sam felt a presence on the outer edges of his consciousness. It wasn’t a demon, but he couldn’t entirely identify it. Ruby’s borrowed flesh paled. “Do you feel –“

“What is it?” he demanded, grabbing her and trying to thrust her behind him.

The lights started to blink, not that Sam needed any kind of confirmation that whatever this was might be supernatural. Not with this… stirring at his mind, at his blood. Things on surfaces – a bottle of whiskey, the leftover takeout containers, the crappy prints hanging on the wall – started to vibrate. The bathroom mirror shattered, which was no great loss to the hunter. He grabbed Ruby’s knife from under the pillow and his Taurus from under the mattress and stood.

The television changed channels of its own accord, moving to a channel that didn’t exist and only displaying static. Ruby tugged her underwear on, coming to stand beside him. He tried to thrust her behind him again but she batted his hand away with a muttered, “You’re kidding, right?”

The door swung open like a hurricane had blown it in and a man followed. In a way it seemed to be anticlimactic – all this drama almost like an earthquake just to have a regular guy walk in. He looked kind of like an accountant, in a cheap suit with a backwards blue tie and a tan trench coat. His hair, though – there was nothing remotely debit or credit oriented about that hair. Maybe the wind had messed it around, or maybe he like Sam and Ruby had been interrupted post coitus. The guy was a little shy of six feet and he strode into the room looking straight ahead with the most intense blue eyes Sam had ever seen. There was nothing human about those eyes. The power radiating off this… whatever he was… it was the strangest thing he’d ever sensed in his life, like electricity and steam and ice and wind all at the same time.

“Sam Winchester,” the creature intoned in a deep, gravelly voice. “We need to speak.” He turned his head slightly to look directly at Ruby, who actually quailed at his gaze. “Privately.”

“Nuh-uh, buddy,” the demon retorted. “I don’t know who the Hell you think you are, but you’re not getting your hands on Sammy.”

“I don’t believe that there is much you could do to stop me, demon,” the stranger intoned. His voice lacked any kind of emotional indicator. Sam reached out with his mind, looking to get some kind of a read on the thing. “But I would prefer that Sam cooperated. I believe that he will want to hear what I have to say.”

Sam blinked. “Are you… possessing that guy?” he blurted, trying to sort out what he sensed from the creature.

“He’s not a demon, Sam,” Ruby pointed out.

“I am not. I’m an angel of the Lord.” He waved a hand and Sam’s gun disappeared. “Your gun would do you no good, but I am reluctant to risk accidents.” He eyed Sam down the length of his body, lingering near the hips to remind the hunter that his body at least was starting to see a fight or flight situation as a good enough reason for round two. “We have much to discuss, Sam Winchester.”

“And who are you again?” he demanded, not lowering the knife. Shame wasn’t something he was about to concern himself with. Not right now anyway.

“My name is Castiel. I’m an angel of the Lord.” He glanced around himself. “Perhaps we could go someplace less squalid?”

Ruby snorted, a show of bravado. “Buddy, you haven’t even begun to see squalid. This place is a palace compared to some of the places we’ve bunked down.”

“What, are you afraid you’re going to get tetanus?” Sam shot back. Adrenaline coursed through his veins, shortening his temper.

“She is not capable of becoming ill, Sam. She is a demon.”

“I know. I got the memo. So you are possessing that guy.” He reached out with his mind, intent on freeing the poor sap.

“Sam, stop.” He held up a hand as a light started to shine from inside the creature’s skin. “Jimmy is a devout man. He actually prayed for this.”

Sam paused for a moment and then released the creature he felt against his mind. He didn’t have the strength to pull it anyway; Ruby’s hand on the small of his back reminded him of that. “Why would I believe you’re an angel?”

“All of these years you’ve been praying and you’ve never once believed that an angel would appear before you, Sam Winchester?” A little smile appeared at the corners of his mouth. “Is your faith so small?”

“I believe in God,” Sam attested. “And I believe in angels. I just don’t think either of them has much of a place here.” He snorted. “So what are you really? Fae? Pagan god?”

The – whatever it was – tilted his head to one side. “You don’t believe. You have touched my grace, albeit briefly, and yet you don’t believe. Perhaps if you felt more…”

“No. Hell no,” Ruby objected, coming to stand in between Sam and the creature. “Whatever it is you are, no one is touching anything. The guy is too new, too young, too –“

“Valuable?” Castiel inquired, raising an eyebrow. “Indeed. I must concur with you there. But valuable to whom?”

“If you are what you say you are then you already know that. He’s valuable to me. To himself.”

“He hardly looks as though he’s valuable to himself, does he, Ruby?”

“He’s getting there. You should have seen him when I found him again.”

Sam cleared his throat. “Uh, guys? Right here.”

Ruby glared at him for a moment. “Sam, put some pants on for crying out loud.”

He passed her the knife and grabbed his jeans from where he’d left them next to the bed. “So you said I ‘touched your grace’, as you would call it.”

“Yes, just now when you attempted to exorcise me from Jimmy Novak’s body. I am not a demon – a demon is a human soul, of course, warped and twisted by its time in Hell until it becomes a monster.”

“Thanks,” Ruby sneered.

“I have never been human, but the principle is much the same. My grace, for your purposes at least, functions in much the same way. It is my… well, the best way to explain it is my energy, my essence. Like the black smoke of a demon or the soul of a human. Reach out with your mind and touch it, but do not tug. Just take hold.”

He glanced at Ruby, who by this point was as white as the corpse she was riding. “I don’t like this, Sammy,” she told him.

“It’s the only way,” he shrugged, and closed his eyes.

_Light. Light and frost and ambient electricity crackling everywhere, neither form nor flesh. Castiel was thought, and intent and power. He had been since the beginning of time, since the Earth was a rock floating in the vastness of space, and he would be when the earth was a lifeless rock once again. There were others, also light and electricity but their colors were different in ways that Sam knew his human eyes might never be able to even see but here, with his mind he could perceive all of the minute variations between their shades._

_And the wings! While the angels had no form they had shape, and that shape included wings that were an extension of that same thing Sam touched now. Castiel’s were blue, the same as his eyes, with black shading and magnificent. He glimpsed memories – Anael, with her shimmering red grace, and Balthazar with lavender and gold. Lucifer, and wasn’t that a funny thing? Because he was the purest and most beautiful of all in Castiel’s memory._

_And the voices! They didn’t so much speak as sing, a sound that could probably break Sam’s soul right in two if he let himself hear it for any length of time. Perfect pitch, perfect harmony, none of it meant for human ears at all. That such a sound of pure beauty could carry such messages as it did – messages of war, of business, orders to “stand and watch,” to “interrogate.”_

Sam withdrew, hands shaking, and opened his eyes. When he looked at Castiel he still saw the body of Jimmy Novak but if he didn’t actively try not to he could see the vague blue outline of Castiel’s grace radiating out from him. “Okay,” he breathed when he could speak again. “You’re an angel.”

Ruby grabbed her clothes. “Look, Sam, we need to run!”

“If I wished to smite you I would have already done so,” Castiel pointed out. “Nevertheless, I would prefer to speak with Sam privately.”

“Sam, you can’t trust angels,” Ruby pointed out, drawing her clothes on. “They are not on our side here.”

“All I want is to converse with you, Sam. I am not asking for your immortal soul.” The angel’s mouth quirked up.

“Yeah, no one’s got much use for that.” He helped Ruby find her purse and keys. “Look. I’ll talk to the guy. If someone wants to help us – well, we could use all the allies we can get, right?” He met her eyes and held them for a moment.

She looked away first. “Yeah. Right. You’re right, of course. Give me a call when you’re, uh, ready. I’ll go entertain myself for a little while.” She faked a little smile and gave him a peck on the cheek. Sam didn’t ask how she’d entertain herself. She was what she was and he didn’t really want to know much more.

“All right.” He turned back to Castiel and grabbed his shirt off the floor. “Don’t get me wrong. It’s… impressive… to actually meet an angel. I’m just… surprised.”

“You don’t think that angels are likely to take an interest in you, Sam?”

“I have demon blood in me. Angels and demons aren’t recorded as playing nicely together.” He drew his tee shirt over his head and sat down in one of the chairs.

“Your physiology is unique,” his companion admitted, sitting stiffly in the other chair. “Your soul is human. I would not have let your… companion… touch my grace. She could not have done so, in fact.”

“Is that so?”

“Some extremely powerful demons can directly confront an angel. Ruby is not one of them. Why are you in her company?”

“She’s helping me to learn how to fight Lilith.” He met the angel’s eyes. “I can’t do it by myself. Not yet.”

“And is sexual intercourse required for fighting Lilith?” He glanced at the messy bed before looking back at Sam.

Why should Sam be ashamed? “It makes her happy. It doesn’t make sense to antagonize the person who’s helping you. Can I get you anything? A beer? Do angels drink beer?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it again. “I have never tried to drink beer. Or anything else. Angels do not require sustenance. But I will try one.”

Sam got up and grabbed them beers. Dean would have hated these beers; he would have mocked the fancy bottles and the small brewery. He’d have loved the taste. “So I still don’t know what an angel would want with me and Ruby.”

The smaller man – creature – cleared his throat. “My business is not with Ruby, Sam. That’s why I asked her to leave – it’s not just that angels and demons tend to make a mess when we’re in each other’s space for any length of time. My business is with you. Sam, you mourn for your brother, yes?”

“How can you even ask that? You’re still mourning for Lucifer and he’s still alive!” Sam snapped.

Castiel blinked. Sam hadn’t realized that the guy wasn’t blinking until he did it now, his grace dimming slightly as he fell silent for a few seconds. “I didn’t realize that you had seen that far. I am sorry. It was inappropriate of me.” He recovered himself. “Nevertheless, you are mourning for him. And yet you are focused on revenge instead of rescue.”

“I only know of one way to rescue him,” Sam growled, “and I had nothing to offer.”

Now the angel smiled slightly. “What if I told you that I could offer you another way, Sam?”

He felt a corner of his own mouth twitch of its own volition. “I’d probably tell you to pull the other one.”

Castiel frowned and shook his head. “Pull the other what?”

“Never mind. It’s an expression. It means I don’t believe you.”

“Sam, Heaven has decided that your brother still has work ahead of him. And that he frankly deserves to be saved. We have weighed our options. I can lead a garrison of angels in to pull him out, but this would likely cost the lives of many angels and is not necessarily a guarantee of success. Or…”

He found himself leaning forward in spite of himself. “Or what?”

“Or I enlist the assistance of someone with a strong interest in getting him out. Someone who has the ability to fight demons on their own turf. Someone who is of Hell without actually being a demon. Someone who wants what we want.” He leaned forward and put a hand over Sam’s. “Someone like Sam Winchester.”

Sam let his eyes meet Castiel’s for another moment. It sounded plausible. It sounded beautiful, honestly. Even after his failure to prevent Dean from going to Hell in the first place, even after his soul had proved worthless, he could still find a way to save Dean. Then he shook his head. “I can barely exorcise a minor level demon, Castiel,” he objected. “And even one of those leaves me drained for the rest of the day. And all I do when I pull one is send it back to Hell. I want to do this. I really do – I mean, I’d give anything I had to be what you need – but I’m not the guy you’re looking for.”

“It will require a great deal more training,” Castiel nodded. “And it will not be without danger to you.”

He laughed out loud. “I’m not sure what part of me is giving the impression that I’m worried about myself.”

The angel grimaced. “You will need to be in better condition. You will need to actually eat food.” He gestured to the three quarters of a sandwich still on the table. “And I will need to help train you.”

Sam screwed up his face in what he knew was probably about his least attractive expression. “What’s wrong with the training Ruby’s giving me? I mean, you’re an angel. She’s teaching me to use my demonic side.”

He sighed. “Sam, not all of your abilities are entirely demonic. And I can… I can see the pathways in your brain better than she can, really. But have you not given any consideration to where Ruby gets her information? How she managed to escape Lilith’s clutches after Lilith took over her host and exorcised her back to Hell?”

Sam’s mouth went dry. “No. No, Ruby’s helping me.”

“Ruby is helping Ruby, Sam. You needn’t take my word for it. You can see right into her heart when she returns.”

“The reason for the sex,” Sam surmised, without even realizing that he was speaking out loud. He wished he could say that he was surprised, or that he didn’t believe the angel. Neither was true. He’d never given Ruby’s information sources much thought, and of course she’d managed to get out of hell somehow.

Castiel frowned again. “I thought you believed that it made her happy.”

“I’m sure it did. Does. Whatever. But there were other things she does. Like, um. You know what? You’re an angel. You don’t care about this kind of crap. Let’s just say I think it was to lull me into a false sense of security.” He felt his cheeks get hot. “Um… you know, trying to make herself seem more human. Or something. Like that’s important to me.” He rolled his eyes. “Let’s pretend, for a moment, that I believe you. What do I need to do to know if she’s telling the truth?” Yeah, Castiel. Tell me, how can I tell if I’m being used yet again by another demon - and while we’re at it, why don’t you share what it is that you’re getting out of this? He bit down on his cheek and avoided voicing those thoughts out loud. Maybe the angel was helping. Maybe he wasn’t. Letting his blood boil wasn’t going to get him answers.

“Work with me, Sam. I’ll help you to develop your abilities, and we’ll harrow Hell together. You seem to have no moral issue working with your abilities?” He raised an eyebrow.

“Dean never liked them – well, he never knew about these. But I… I know he wouldn’t like these. He didn’t like it when they were just visions that I couldn’t control, you know? He definitely didn’t want me using them or trying to get control of them.” He pressed his lips together. “But not using them didn’t make me less of a freak.”

“He may not be pleased by your surrender to them when he is freed.” The angel didn’t move any part of himself when he spoke, only his mouth. He didn’t blink, he didn’t wrinkle his nose. He didn’t move his hands and he didn’t twitch his arms.

“No, he’ll be furious. And that’s… something I’ll have to deal with. If he even finds out.” He sighed. “But I can worry about it when he’s out.”

“These abilities, they mark you as other, Sam. I want you to trust me and if you’re going to trust me you need to know that I’m not trying to hide anything from you. When you start developing these abilities you’ll grow farther apart from your humanity, become more ‘other.’ Is this a path you’re willing to take?”

Sam laughed a little, and even he knew that there was no humor in it. “Castiel, I’m screwing a demon. I’ve known that I’ve got demon blood in me for over a year. I may not even entirely know what I am, but I have to accept that whatever it is isn’t human. Not really. If that makes me more ‘fair game’ than I was when Gordon Walker and his buddies were hunting me, that’s fine.”

The angel paused. “You really don’t care, do you? Rest assured, Sam, that your soul should remain untouched by anything I would ask of you. Your soul is pure and human. The only thing that can condemn you is your choices.”

“Like screwing a demon.” He smirked.

Castiel’s dark head tilted to one side again. “If you believe that the choice damns you, why do you continue to do it?” Sam felt his own head tilt in response and fought the urge. The angel was handsome, he had to admit that, but it wasn’t his body. Not at all, and Sam shouldn’t be looking at him with lust in the first place.

“It has its good points. Besides, like I said before, she’s helping me.” He shrugged. “If I keep her happy she keeps helping me. It’s not exactly rocket science.” He took a swig from his beer.

“Do you feel compelled to enter into a sexual contract with me as well?” Sam choked on his beer. “I did not know that sex was a common way for human males to pay for assistance.”

“Is that something that you need from me, Cas?” Sam rasped, shocked into the nickname.

“I am an angel. There is no sexual requirement for angels.”

“Then why would you even ask that?”

“I was confused by your expectations.”

His stomach lurched. “That’s not something to expect of anyone, Castiel.” Should an angel really need to be told this? “It’s only okay if it’s freely given, you know? And your… meat suit… I guess… is very attractive. Yeah. But he’s still in there. So… kind of gross.” Okay. The host body was more than “very attractive,” he was hot, but he wasn’t the one choosing to use the body in that way. “Besides. That’s not what you need or what, so it’s not what we’re talking about here. Okay?” he tried to wrestle the conversation away from sexuality and toward Dean. “What exactly do you get out of the deal?”

“What do you mean?”

“I get my brother out of Hell, and I get to be part of what got him out of Hell instead of the dumbass who got him sent there in the first place. What do you get out of it? No one does something for nothing.” He shook his head.

“You don’t believe that even angels do something out of the goodness of their hearts?” He raised his eyebrows.

“You’re light and electricity and intent,” Sam retorted. “You don’t have hearts.”

Castiel gave an actual laugh then - a small one, to be sure, but an actual laugh nonetheless. “A valid point. Dean Winchester will be saved. It relates to an obscure prophecy, but that isn’t a concern. Will you work with me?” He held out a hand.

Sam took it without hesitation. “Of course. If I’ve got a snowball’s chance of saving Dean I’m taking it.”

Cas covered his larger hand in both of his and gave a genuine smile. Sam could feel the grace surrounding him, washing over his skin. “Excellent. Call your demon friend and we will prove her true faith.”

He withdrew his hand. “Torture?”

“Not necessarily. I hope that we will not need it. And Ruby is a survivor. She will not subject herself to such treatment if she need not do so.”

Sam obediently called Ruby, who returned to the motel within the hour. Neither male moved against her until she put her things down and closed the door behind her, at which point Castiel gestured and Ruby found herself unable to move. “What the Hell, Sam?” she seethed, eyes going black as she raged.

“Sam, I want you to reach out and touch her essence just as you touched my grace earlier. Don’t tug, just touch,” the angel directed, eyes on Ruby. The blue glow poured from his eyes more strongly now.

Sam obeyed. Ruby wasn’t exactly a revelation to him – he’d mentally touched demons before and she wasn’t substantially different from them, oily black smoke and seething power. Unlike with an angel he could feel that she had a form, or at least the echo of one: distinctly female, although she was capable of possessing a man, and unlike with the angel he could sense emotion. Again, this wasn’t exactly a revelation; he’d just never really poked around. Demons were kind of inherently emotional after all. He felt her rage, her pain, her hate and her fear. “Got her,” he said, opening his eyes. Ruby strained against the invisible bonds that held her, chest heaving even though she didn’t need to do petty human things like breathe. Guilt twinged at his heart. After all, she’d helped him, kept him alive, shown him how to go after the source of his problems and here he was violating her privacy.

“Ruby, who are you working for?” Castiel demanded in his calm, unflappable voice.

“I’m working for Sam, dumbass,” she spat. “Or I was before the two of you put me through this.”

“Then why did you just get more scared?” Sam wanted to know, bitterness rising in his throat. It tasted an awful lot like bile. “It was like… like a firework on the fourth of July.” He moistened his lips. “What kind of game are you playing here?” Yeah, he’d been played all right. All that remained was figuring out how badly.

More fireworks, more red. “Sam, I’m telling you. I’m just trying to help you get revenge on Lilith!”

“You’re desperate. It’s… kind of blue. Dark blue. You’re lying. And sweating, which your host body doesn’t usually do.” A flash of a name popped into his head, although he couldn’t quite tell if it was out of paranoia or from any kind of psychic cause. “Lilith. You’re working for Lilith.”

“No.” Now everything was red. She was terrified.

He tightened his grip slightly. “Tell the truth, Ruby.” He didn’t yell, he didn’t even growl.

She cried out. “Sam, stop! You don’t know what it’s like!”

“Enlighten me.”

Castiel put a hand on his shoulder. “You can let her go, Sam.”

He released his mental hold, not realizing until now that he had the beginnings of a dull headache. “Sorry. I had to… I had to know. I can’t believe this.” Except that he could. At least the last time he’d been forced by circumstance into dancing to a demon’s tune. This time he’d just gone along like a dimwitted baby goat.

“You were desperate,” the angel pointed out. His hand had not moved. “She was offering you something to hold onto.”

“I saved your damn life,” the demon spat. “You could try a little gratitude.”

“You’re working for the demon who’s been trying to kill me for over a year and you want gratitude?” He stepped away as she flopped down onto a chair. “That’s… that’s nice. How long, Ruby?”

“Sam –“

He slammed his hands down onto the table and spun around, face so close to hers that their noses were almost touching. “How. Long?” he yelled, and she jumped.

“Since I got back,” she sighed. “She forced me out of the blonde host body the night Dean… died. Locked me down nice and tight on Alastair’s rack, and let me tell you that Alastair is not the guy you want anywhere near you. He’s… there is no one better when it comes to torture, Sam. There is no one he can’t break. No one he hasn’t broken. He had your father.” She looked up and met his eyes for a moment, and he had to force himself to not look away. Another one of his failures, because John wouldn’t have been there at all if Sam had just killed Azazel when he’d had the chance. Yeah, it had made Dean happy that he hadn’t done it and killed John in the process, but the way things had turned out? The cost had been too high. “Anyway, she approached me after a couple of months of the best Alastair had to offer and made me an offer. I got to come back if I came to you and picked things up where they left off. Got you to start training.”

“Training to kill her? Why?”

“I don’t know. Yet. But it’s big. Like, Apocalyptic big. I know she wants to free Lucifer.” The name sent a crackle of something - electricity, terror, excitement, primal fear - down Sam’s spine. “I don’t know how she plans to do that, but it’s probably got something to do with that.” She sighed. “I honestly have no idea how you play into that, Sam. I don’t. She just told me to teach you to use your powers and get you to trust me. I’d learn the rest when I needed to and I guess that I just haven’t needed to yet. I mean, yeah. I know it’s probably something you’re not going to be real fond of but it’s not like she can kill you, right?”

He remembered back to being shunted off in his own body, watching his hands tying Jo to the post. “There are fates worse than death,” he pointed out, stepping back out of her space and running his hands through his hair. He’d trusted her. He didn’t need to know where he figured into Lilith’s plan to free Lucifer from his cage - the fact that he was part of that plan, in any way at all, made his stomach lurch.

She smirked up at Castiel. “So I suppose now’s the part where you smite me?”

“No.”

Both Sam and Ruby looked at the angel. “Seriously?”

“Losing you makes it obvious to Lilith that the mission has been compromised. You get to live, Ruby.” He smiled grimly. “You might prefer it to be otherwise, but you will live. And you will help us one way or another.”

“Look. I like you, Sam. I don’t want you to get hurt. But angels? No way.” She glared at Castiel, and Sam could tell that this wasn’t false bravado this time. She had nothing to lose. “They have the good PR, but it doesn’t matter how ‘helpful’ I am. I’m still what I am. They’ll use me up and throw me away when they’re done with me, and that’s assuming that my own kind don’t find out that I’m helping the other side and get me first. I’d rather you just killed me outright. At least then there’s just nothingness.

“And you –“ she smirked at Sam. “Don’t you even think you’re ‘special’ somehow. I don’t know what they’ve got cooking up, but if they’re trying to drag a part-demon kid into it it can’t be good. Not for you. They’re not going to be grateful. They’re going to throw you out like trash, Sam, and they’re not going to care about your pretty eyes or your pretty, pretty soul. As far as they’re concerned you’re one of us.”

He swallowed. He’d let himself hope that the presence of an angel might suggest that he wasn’t damned, but it had been foolish. “It doesn’t matter,” he shrugged. “If Castiel can help me get Dean out of Hell he can kill me after we’re done, I don’t care. He can send me to Hell, reduce me to ash, it doesn’t matter. As long as Dean is safe and not suffering.”

She laughed. “Sam – nothing can get Dean out!”

“No one thing,” Castiel agreed. “But Sam can. Working with an angel. It’s not going to be easy, but Heaven has decided that Dean Winchester does not merit Hell. These are my orders. Sam has chosen to join me. You are going to assist us.”

She rolled her eyes. “What makes you think I’m not going to betray you? I mean, him I’m kind of invested in. You? Not so much. We’re kind of diametrically opposed.”

“I will set a seal upon your heart, Ruby.” He smiled softly and stepped forward, splaying a hand out on her chest. The hand glowed briefly with white light, and her chest glowed red. She screamed. “You cannot betray us now,” he informed her, stepping back and wiping his hand on his trench coat as she sagged back gasping.

“You bastard,” she whimpered. Sam stepped forward and took her into his arms. “What did you do?”

“It’s an ancient spell. You will be unable to reveal our work, our knowledge or our purpose.” He glanced at Sam, seeming confused. “Her loyalty was questionable. Now it is assured.”

Sam frowned as Ruby buried her face in his chest. “You don’t think that interferes with free will just a little bit?”

He tilted his head to the side. “Free will is not a concept with which angels generally concern ourselves, Sam. We serve Heaven. We are agents of God’s will. We have orders. Mine are to get your brother out of Hell, using whatever means are necessary.”

The thought was more chilling for its matter-of-fact, almost gentle delivery. “All right,” Sam exhaled. “Where do we start?”

“We need to build up your strength,” the angel smiled. “You need to eat. And sleep. Tomorrow we go hunting – all three of us.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam, Cas and Ruby make some new friends. Sam meets a friend of Castiel's.

 

  


As Castiel had suggested their training began the next day.  The only reason to wait was for Sam, whose silly little human body still needed to do things like sleep.  He offered to start that night but both angel and demon agreed that this was not an acceptable solution so he stripped again and he lay down and he closed his eyes.  He didn’t dream, much to his surprise.

When he woke the next morning Castiel was still sitting in the same chair he’d taken when Sam went to bed the night before.  That had to leave some kind of crick in the back or something – Sam had slept for a good ten hours, he never did that.  “Are you okay, Cas?”

 

“Hasn’t moved a muscle.”  Ruby had, of course.  She’d twitched and flitted her way around the room.  Sam could, if he didn’t stop himself, feel her discomfort at Cas’ presence.  That had changed even since yesterday, even with the brief tutelage Castiel had provided.  He’d seen so much that now he had a hard time not seeing – seeing the grace underneath Cas’ borrowed skin, seeing Ruby’s true form in her stolen body.

“I was watching over you.  You had nightmares.”  The angel turned to look at him.  

He frowned, pausing as he looked for clothes.  He didn’t feel any particular shame about his nudity – it wasn’t as though either of them hadn’t seen everything the night before anyway. “I didn’t dream at all, Cas.”

“They began before you would have remembered them.  I placed you into a deeper, more restful stage of sleep.  Your body required it.  You made excellent progress yesterday, Sam.  How do you feel today?”

“Excellent progress,” Ruby muttered, and glowered at the window.

“I feel great, actually,” Sam had to admit.  “No headache to speak of.  You… put me into a deeper sleep?”  He couldn’t tell if that was helpful or creepy or both.

“Your body needed sleep.  As I mentioned, if we are to succeed in this venture we will need to improve your physical condition.” 

“It’s just meat.”  He made a face.  The meat was useful only as far as it went in getting his brother back.  Its condition was important only as far as it related to his performance in that task. 

“It’s the only ‘meat’ you have, and you cannot replace it.  You are the only one who can retrieve your brother, Sam.”  He turned his head to Ruby.  “You said he was worse when you found him?”

She rolled her eyes.  “You have no idea, buddy.” 

“Very well.  Humans require sustenance.  We will find breakfast.” 

Sam winced, but he grabbed their things and led them out to the Impala before checking them out of the motel and driving them to a diner.  He ordered coffee and a vegetable omelet (egg whites only, which he did partly to see the face Ruby made) and toast.  Ruby got pancakes and fries, a combination that got a funny look from their older waitress but she dutifully wrote it down.  “You’re going to have a stroke before you’re thirty, sugar,” the woman observed.  “And for you, handsome?”

Castiel looked flummoxed.  “I don’t –“ he began. “

He’ll have coffee and French toast,” Sam interrupted.  “Side of turkey sausage.”

As the waitress left Cas tilted his head again.  It put Sam in mind of a bird, a pigeon looking in a window.  Was this something all angels did or just Castiel?  “Why did you order food for me?” he wondered.  “I am an angel.  We don’t eat." 

“I get that, I really do.  But the thing is, you don’t exactly want to announce to the world that you’re an angel, do you?”  He picked at his napkin.  “Otherwise you wouldn’t bother with the host body –“ 

“Vessel,” Cas corrected with a little pout.  “Demons have host bodies.  Angels take vessels.” 

Ruby rolled her eyes again.  “Like that matters.  The point is that you’re here trying to pass as a human, right?  Not stand out?”  The creature sitting across from her nodded.  “Then you have to do human things when humans can see you.  When I’m around humans I eat.  I wear clothes.” 

“You were not wearing clothes last night.” 

“What Sam and I were doing when you showed up last night had nothing to do with faking humanity and everything to do with him being hot,” she snorted.  “And very talented.” 

“Still right here,” Sam pointed out, blushing again. 

“What?  It’s true.  I’m sure you won’t… want that again now that you know about Lilith.  But I enjoyed it, because it was good.”  She shrugged.  “You’ve got game, Winchester.  Own it.” “

Anyway.”  Sam cleared his throat, cheeks blazing.  “Three people showing up in a diner but only two eating is something that sticks out in people’s minds.  If we’re supposed to keep a low profile, you need to not stick out.  Have you ever tried to eat food before?”

“No angel has walked the earth in two thousand years.  I do not know if we can eat food,” he intoned. 

“Look.  Try the breakfast.  If you don’t like it, I’ll teach you the Sam Winchester Method of Pretending to Eat.  It’s worked for me since 1986, it’ll work for you.”  He smiled brightly. 

“Don’t think it’s working on us with that omelet,” his demonic guardian chastised as the waitress returned with coffee.  “You need the protein.” 

“I like eggs.  I like broccoli.”  He shrugged.  “I’ll eat what I can.”

As it turned out, Castiel was unimpressed by the French toast until he drowned it in maple syrup.  Then he couldn’t get enough.  Who knew an angel could have a sweet tooth?  Sam had a lot of questions about that but he bit them back.  It wasn’t really his business if the sweet tooth came from the vessel – Jimmy, he reminded himself, the poor guy had a name – or if it was something the angel actually enjoyed himself for his own reasons.  It didn’t have any bearing on saving Dean after all, and he needed to keep himself focused. 

Their first hunt was one that Ruby had found for him anyway – demonic signs down in the Pensacola area.  She’d already told Lilith that they were planning to take it on so it would be suspicious if they didn’t go.  Evidently not all demons were enamored of Lilith’s rule, much like Ruby herself, so Lilith sometimes took the opportunity to rid herself of some rivals by using Ruby to send Sam on “training missions.”  His stomach turned, and he had to push away his plate.  He’d been shoring up her position this whole time.  Not terribly effectively, it was true, but still – every demon he’d exorcised, every demon who’d been taken out via the knife, had been working toward the same goal he had and now they were gone. 

Cas pushed the plate back.  “You didn’t know,” he offered.  “You couldn’t have known.  And now you’ll fix it.”

“How?” he growled.  “If we’re just going to go after the same demons we were going to go after in the first place and do Lilith’s dirty work for her anyway?” 

“I have a few ideas.  They’ll probably sit better on your conscience too.”  He glanced at Ruby.  “You’ll use skills similar to what you practiced last night, but in a bit of a different way.” 

“Yeah, you want to talk to me about how you managed to put the hurt on like that?” Ruby grimaced, sipping from her coffee.  “You shouldn’t be ready for that yet.  Not by a long shot.” 

“You knew I could do that?”  He glanced up from his plate, where he moved the food around in an attempt to avoid putting more of it into his mouth. 

“I mean, yeah.  You come from Yellow Eyes – by demonic reckoning you’re as much his son as John Winchester’s.  He could do it, his daughter can do it, why wouldn’t you?  But… you should need a lot more work and a lot more…  I was pretty sure you weren’t ready.”  She moistened her lips.  “It’s not really a thing most demons can do, for the record.” 

“She’s right.  I knew that you could feel the soul,” Castiel added.  “I was not aware that you would be able to find your way toward adding pressure so easily, but I was able to watch as you made that connection.  How did you do that, Sam?” 

He shifted, looking down.  The answer of course was that he was a freak, but the doubted that answer would be complete enough to satisfy his companions.  “I don’t know.  I just… instinct, I guess.  I wasn’t trying to hurt you, Ruby.  I’m angry, I feel used, but I don’t want to hurt you.  I’m sorry.  I just wanted to grab a little tighter, that’s all.” “That’s all.” 

 She snorted.  “That’s one Hell of a ‘that’s all.’  Whatever.  It’s a damn fine weapon to have in our arsenal.” 

“Is it something… is it something they’re using on Dean?” he whispered. 

“Probably not,” she tossed back.  “I mean, he’s not an actual demon.  And I’m pretty sure Alastair can’t actually do that.”  She waggled her eyebrows at him.  “I told you that you were something special, Sam.” 

This was a kind of special he didn’t want, and he looked down again.  Cas’ hand covered his.  “Sam, it’s okay.  I know that Azazel and his connection to you repulse you.”  He caught Sam’s eyes, lifting them from the table.  “But they are not things that you can change.  And you have the opportunity to do Heaven’s work here.  You can use this… blight… to save people, to save your brother.”

He swallowed.  “Yeah.  Yeah, you’re right, Cas.”

The angel smiled.  “Good.  Now eat.” Ruby rolled her eyes again.  Sam privately thought that if she rolled them any more she’d turn into a slot machine.   He didn’t share that impression.  He didn’t think she’d see the humor.

After breakfast they piled into the Impala.  No matter that it had been five weeks since Dean died, he still found himself automatically going for the passenger side.  He caught himself and re-oriented toward the driver side and let Ruby and Cas sort out who got shotgun. He didn’t much care who won, but in the end Ruby wasn’t willing to push such a powerful creature too far and took the back seat.  They drove for about eight hours before the pair determined that he’d had enough driving – their targets were fairly entrenched and not likely to run.  Sam had never had parents, not really – John hadn’t really given a crap about his well being, Dean was four years older than he was and didn’t know any better and Azazel oh yeah was a demon who wasn’t involved with his actual upbringing anyway – but if he had to imagine what it would be like to be a young teen with overbearing parents this was probably what it would look like.  They didn’t even sleep, but they counted how much sleep he got and how much he ate and how much of what he drank… He had no idea how to handle it.  No one had actually cared about that, about him or his health or his well being, since Jess. They found a motel (Sam suggested squatting; they overruled him) and then Castiel decided that now would be a good time to start training again.  They would not experiment on Ruby, however.  Sam drew the line at that.  The angel suggested working on controlling his telekinesis, and Sam found that he was more than okay with that.  It was something to work on when he wasn’t out hunting, endangering himself and others with techniques that might or might not work.

He’d never managed to effectively use telekinesis on demand, only when there was some kind of strong emotional impetus behind the action like Dean’s imminent death.  Sometimes even that hadn’t been enough to help, if there was a demon of sufficient power present to prevent it from working.  Of course he’d never really tried in a more controlled setting either, because it bothered Dean and John and Bobby.  “Relax,” Castiel urged, putting a hand on his arm as the frustration crept up in his gullet again.  He was trying to move the demon-killing knife from the nightstand to the table.  All he’d managed to accomplish was a little bit of rocking that might have been caused by a passing big rig.  “You need to be calm, Sam.”

“I am calm,” he bit out.

“No.  You are frustrated and ashamed.  You’re ashamed of not meeting our expectations and you’re ashamed that meeting our expectations makes you a monster.  You need to let go of that shame, on both sides.  You are doing this for your brother.  Any sacrifice is acceptable as long as it frees Dean, correct?” Sam nodded.  His head throbbed; nodding was probably not the best gesture for him to be making right now, but he couldn’t really speak.  Everything hurt.  The guy had a point.  Anything was okay as long as Dean got out of Hell.  He reached out again.  This was nothing to be ashamed of.  After all, Dad had known a telekinetic once, had even let Sam meet him when he’d been all of what, nine?  Fred Jones, right?  He’d given him his first beer, and no one had ever suggested that Fred was a monster.  He was just a really nice guy – maybe more gentle with Sam than anyone else in his life had been in those days, had he seen something in him?  Whatever – that wasn’t important right now.  If moving things with his mind didn’t make Fred a monster it didn’t make Sam a monster either.  The knife flew over to the table and landed with a thud, skittering across the surface and nearly falling onto the ground.

“Nice work, wonder boy,” Ruby observed.

Castiel passed him some water and brushed a hand over his head.  Sam leaned into the touch for a brief moment before realizing what he was doing and leaning away again.  “Sorry about that,” he muttered.  His head felt better.

“There is nothing to be sorry for, Sam.  You pushed through a powerful mental block.  You had a headache as a result.  I have healed it.  You should not experience pain when you use your telekinesis any longer.”

Sam shook his head.  “A mental block was causing the headaches?” “Part of them, yes.  The mind and the body are strongly connected, Sam.  More so in your case because of your unique physiology.  A demon is a creature entirely of the mind and spirit, and you are part demon.”  He frowned.  “I’ve displeased you.”

Ruby smirked and walked over with some takeout menus that had been helpfully supplied by management.  “He doesn’t like being reminded of that, Feathers.” “It is merely a fact.  If it were not a fact he could not save his brother.”  He reached out again.  “You are in a room with two beings of the mind and spirit, Sam.  Being partially one yourself is not a source of shame.”  He left his hand on Sam’s arm.

“I – okay.”  He blinked.  “Let’s, uh, yeah.  Okay.”

They ordered takeout and stayed in for the night.  Castiel spent some time watching the television trying to improve his grasp of human culture.  Sam spent some time discussing witchcraft with Ruby.  He wasn’t planning to offer up his own soul to any demons, of course, but there was no reason that he shouldn’t know what was going on when he encountered witchcraft or know his way around spell work.  Bobby Singer used spell work all the time and no one had any kind of problem with that, right?  And Castiel would say something if the witchcraft was actually some kind of problem.  Not that he should trust the angel, not really.  The guy was working for Heaven, but if Heaven had really wanted Dean to not be in Hell they wouldn’t have let him go in the first place.  He had his own agenda, there was no doubt about it, and the fact that his agenda happened to coincide with Sam’s at the moment was no reason to get complacent.  He’d gotten complacent with Ruby and that had almost ended in disaster.

He found himself being “subtly encouraged” to have an early night, and he obeyed.  When he woke the next morning after another blessedly dreamless and restful sleep, for which he gave credit to Castiel, he went for a run and had a quick workout before they went to breakfast and headed further toward Pensacola.

They rolled into town just around dark and got a room.  Then they went out to scout out possible locations for their quarry.  Ruby’s intelligence – more thorough now that she wasn’t pretending that it had come “through the grapevine” – was that the demons in question were squatting in a place near St. Michael’s Cemetery, a fact that made Castiel give an amused little smirk.  He supposed that Castiel knew Michael personally; perhaps the idea of demons in close proximity wouldn’t have appealed to the archangel.

They formed a plan that same night.  Ruby was going to approach them the next morning and lure them into a meeting at a different abandoned house the next night, one Sam and Cas would have spent the day preparing.  Then they would reveal themselves and Sam would get his “practice” in.  Sam was patently unenthusiastic about sending Ruby alone.  She had been working for Lilith, and who knew what Castiel had actually done to her?  Maybe she could break it using witchcraft or convince one of the other demons to break it for her.  Maybe the other demons wouldn’t be so keen on listening to her and would harm her.  Castiel didn’t seem terribly perturbed by that possibility but he allowed that if she came into trouble she could always pray to him.  He would be able to come to her rescue immediately, although it would make it difficult for Sam to practice his abilities on them.

The plan went off without a hitch.  The three demons arrived and split up, wandering through the house in search of whatever crap story Ruby had given them.  Each one of them found itself in a devil’s trap at one point or another, because demons were the product of the corruption of human souls and humans never did remember to look up or under a carpet.  Now Sam and Cas, and Ruby when she showed up a few minutes later, went to each in turn.  The first they approached was riding a reedy-looking middle-aged Asian man; he hissed as Sam approached.  Sam steeled himself for a headache and a fight.  “Wait, Sam,” Cas interjected.  “What do you see, first of all?"

Sam paused and extended his senses.  The demon’s true form was readily apparent to him.  When he reached out to with his mind to touch the creature’s essence he found that it felt different from the other demons with whom he’d interacted – more oil, more greed.  The color red predominated, but not the red of fear.  “Crossroads demon?” he guessed.  “Male, um… not that old, now that I think about it.  Like, maybe a century?”  He grasped around, like bobbing for apples.  “Rick.  Your name is Rick.”

“Very good,” Rick sneered.  “I see you’ve brought a pony with you, Ruby.  How many other tricks does it know?”

“He knows a few, Ricky.”  Ruby smirked.  “That’s a new one for me.”

“I hear he’s got ‘beg’ down.”  Sam growled but Cas put a hand on his shoulder again.  The angel kept touching him and he wasn’t sure why that felt so reassuring.  He didn’t get the sense that the celestial was using his grace or anything, no kind of supernatural influence to try to force him to calm.  So why should just physical contact from him be so beneficial?  “Tell me, what else can he do?  Roll over?  Strip?  Play dead?”

“He’s the one who’s going to be able to take down Lilith, you buffoon.  From what I’m hearing that’s something you might want to be a part of.”  She stepped closer to the devil’s trap.

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.  Doesn’t mean I want any part of Azazel’s little bitch boy.”  He tried to spit at Sam, but the spittle stopped at the edge of the trap.  “You had your chance, boy.  What, you think you can just waltz on in here and have everyone fawn all over you?”Sam glanced at Cas.  “Was someone fawning?”  He turned his head toward Ruby.  “Did you see anyone fawning?”

She considered.  “I thought the waitress at that diner this morning was going to try to take you home and feed you soup until you cried uncle.  Does that count as fawning?”

“I’m giving you an opportunity, Rick.  You can work with us and we can take down Lilith together.  Or you can go back to Hell.”

“Sam, what do you see about the host Rick is using?” Cas murmured into his ear.  “Do you sense his presence, spiritually, at all?”

Sam paused and considered.  “No,” he had to admit.  “It’s not like –“  He wanted to say not like Castiel and Jimmy, because he didn’t want to be accusatory and because that didn’t have the same feeling that he remembered.  “No.  There’s no living soul present in that body.”“So?” Rick scoffed.  “Hunter pulled off a lucky exorcism.  I got right back in but Archie here didn’t make it.”  He tsked his teeth and shook his head.  “So sad.  Pity really.  I really kind of miss his constant complaining.”

“Excellent job, Sam.”  Cas patted his shoulder. “Is that your final answer?”  Sam asked the captive. “Go to Hell!”

“I’m getting there.  I’ll be sure to check in when I do.”  Sam smiled thinly.  He already had a grip on what he wanted; all he had to do was grab and pull.  The demon fought of course, they always fought, but he pulled it out and watched as the red smoke sank into the ground.  The headache didn’t hit him as strongly this time.  He still broke out in a sweat of course, exorcisms were hard work, but he’d managed to avoid the searing agony that usually came with this kind of work.

The next demon – older, wiser, female although wearing a black woman who was barely legal to vote – proved to be a bit more amenable.  She called herself Zille, and she did not care for having Sam’s mental fingers in her mind at all but she understood the alternative.  She was willing to work with them so long as she was able to keep encouraging humans to witchcraft.  Part of Sam didn’t want to encourage that, but he found himself shrugging.  “For now, sure.  I mean, it’s their choices that bring them to you and they know what they’re getting into, right?” Castiel frowned.  “But they’re choosing to give their souls to a demon.”

“As long as the promises are clear.”  He sighed.  “That’s what free will is all about, Castiel.  People are free to make bad choices too.  Otherwise the good choices don’t really count as virtuous, do they?  They’re just kind of rote.”

He worried about the host, of course – Zille’s victim, Keisha, was still in there but Sam didn’t get the sense that she was particularly panicked or desperate.  He made a mental note to talk to her about that at some point.  Right now, it was all about Dean.  He could worry about the morality of the situation later.  The third was just as recalcitrant as Rick, but maybe wiser than his companion.  His name was Peter and his host kind of embodied every white low-income North Florida stereotype; Sam had certainly had enough exposure to all of them all the times he’d lived here with John that he knew that it was rare to find them all in one person but that didn’t mean it didn’t happen.  The stars-and-bars tattoo on his bicep was a nice touch though.  “You don’t scare me,” Pete sneered.

“Okay.”  Sam shrugged.  “I suspect Lilith does, though.  And when you show up back downstairs, she’s going to have a lot of fun with you.”  He paused.  “Does the name Alastair ring any bells?”

The demon paled.  Such a human reaction from something that had at least a couple centuries on him.  “What do you know?” he huffed.

“I know she’ll probably hand you over to him.  And I know that if you work with me, and if we succeed, chances are that Alastair’s going to wind up dead.  I don’t know when or how, but if we make any kind of headway at all we’re going to have to take him out.” Hating himself a little, he let himself squeeze.

Pete cried out, and Sam relented.  “If I join up, you’ll do that to him?”

“Given half a chance,” Sam affirmed.  It probably wasn’t a lie.  He wasn’t interested in torture for torture’s sake but it wasn’t like he had a lot of other weapons at his disposal.

“Fine.  I’m in.  Your Highness.” Sam didn’t like that sobriquet one little bit.

The two remaining demons salted and burned the corpse vacated by the first – Lilith would probably not let him leave Hell for a good long time, but there was no reason to let something else mess with the body.  Then they vacated separately.  There was no reason to draw attention like that, but they would keepin touch with Sam via email and phone.  Sam, Ruby and Castiel vacated too.  They weren’t keen to draw Lilith’s attention either, as though something like Castiel wouldn’t get noticed when Ricky started talking.  They headed back west toward Alabama before looking for new leads.

 

 

 

Alabama had little to offer in terms of demons – one lousy acheri, barely enough to even get worried about except it had latched onto an elementary school and was spending its time biting fourth graders’ heels like it was a thing.  Even Ruby had nothing to offer about that, only that sometimes even demons were stupid.  Sam didn’t need a devil’s trap to exorcise that one, and with Castiel’s help he didn’t find the headache to be terribly challenging either.  It was there, sure, but it wasn’t debilitating or anything.

Zille put them onto another patch of demons near Hattiesburg, Mississippi.  They’d settled into a rhythm by the end of a week.  If you’d told Sam two months ago that his life would consist of traveling the Deep South with an angel and a demon hunting other demons, and that said angel and demon would spend at least half of their time mother-henning him until he wanted to scream, he’d have tried to get you professional help.  As it was this seemed to be how his life was playing out now.  And his abilities – they were developing at a pace that he would never have thought possible.  He made a point of training with them every day, even if they didn’t fight a demon.  After all, it wasn’t just demons that he could be useful against.  He exorcised a possessing ghost in Yazoo City by just changing the way he gripped the entity holding on, sending the spirit along to whatever afterlife awaited it and rescuing the victim from the shotgun Ruby thought was a more expedient solution.  With a little bit of practice he found that his ability to read supernatural energies applied to human energies too, if he wanted to.  It seemed like a terrible breach of privacy to do so, but he could wrap his head around the morality of it after he’d saved Dean.  For now he needed to focus on the task at hand and use every possible advantage that his cursed body offered.  Besides, breach of privacy or no it came in very handy in Crossett, Arkansas, when he found the telltale stain of a black magician’s soul that led them to a reasonably powerful demon.  He managed to exorcise that demon with only a minor nosebleed; a few weeks ago he’d have been useless for days.

 

His ability to see things had its good points and its bad points of course.  On the one hand they could avoid things like haunted hotels and random water spirits and crap like that, and it wasn’t like Sam couldn’t just see who was possessed if he wanted to.  On the other hand, it got to a point pretty quickly where he had to remember not to see things like ghosts and true forms and auras and that could be pretty awkward when he was dealing with a “friendly” demon or when he dodged out of the way of a wing that didn’t exist on this plane.

The dynamic between the three of them had its awkwardness at first.  None of them entirely trusted the others.  Ruby had the most to distrust of course, since Sam had actually physically harmed her without meaning to on the say-so of a complete stranger who then curtailed her free will.  Of course, she had been a spy in Lilith’s service so Sam’s sympathy was tempered to say the least.  Castiel seemed to be constantly working to a timetable that he couldn’t share with either of his companions, and Sam would have been foolish to think that the angel was about to fully trust a demon or someone that demons addressed by a semi-royal title.  Which kept happening, no matter how Sam felt about it.  And as for Sam’s part, he found himself in the constant company of someone who had been selling him out to Lilith for weeks and a guy who made no secret of having motivations that he wouldn’t share with a mere subhuman.  That didn’t exactly fill him with confidence.

Not that Castiel ever said that, or anything like it.  No, Cas was never anything but gentle and respectful toward him.  The guy was blunt, there was no question about that, but angels didn’t really do emotion so that probably had a lot to do with it.  Angels probably didn’t worry much about the effect of their words on one another’s feelings.You didn’t really consider the effect of your words on someone else’s feelings if the other person didn’t have feelings to be hurt in the first place.  Still, he did what was probably his best to encourage Sam to let go of his guilt about his blood, about his abilities.  He tried to encourage him to embrace who and what he was, since it was the only thing that would help Dean.  And while Sam would have expected that the last thing that an angel would want to do would be to have to come into physical contact with a grotesque, tainted, cambion creature as he was, Castie seemed to go out of his way to be in contact with Sam in some way whenever he possibly could.

Sam asked him about that once, as they tracked a handful of Lilith partisans around Delta National Forest.  “You are troubled,” the angel replied after a moment’s thought.  “Humans who are troubled often wish physical contact as a form of comfort.  Your abilities trouble you, your grief troubles you, Ruby’s betrayal troubles you.  The future troubles you.  I wish to comfort you.”

“But why?” Sam pressed.  Ruby was out scouting ahead and it was just the two of them in camp, not that they needed a camp.  Or rather, not that they would have needed a camp if it weren’t for his human frailty.  “I mean, it doesn’t matter if I’m a little stressed.  I can still get the job done.”

“Is it so much to believe that I could wish to see you untroubled, Sam?  You have a tremendous burden on your shoulders.  Is it so unusual that someone would want to support you in other ways?”  He stood close, a hand on Sam’s shoulder.  “Is it uncomfortable to you?”

“No.  Not really.  It’s just unusual, that’s all.”  He ran a hand through his hair.  “Thanks, Cas.”

They caught up to the demons.  As it turned out there were more than they expected.  Castiel was forced to smite two of the six.  Sam exorcised three, while Ruby stabbed one.  Sam hadn’t exorcised three in one go before – not without devil’s traps, anyway.  He found that while the effort tired him out it didn’t leave him with that much of a headache at all.  “It is well,” the angel told them both.  “When we harrow Hell you will not have time for illness, nor for rest.”

Sam swallowed.  “When will that be?”

“Not yet.  You aren’t ready yet.  You’re getting there, but you’re not strong enough.  We have work to do yet.”

Sam started pushing them harder.  He needed more hunts, more demons.  They could join the team or they could go back to Hell.  Most chose exorcism of course, because who was really going to follow a part-human who was still learning to use his ability who had nothing to his name but a car, a traitorous demon mentor and a strange creature at his back that none of them could really identify?  By the time that most of them saw him in action they had either made their choice and stood by it – some demons could be loyal after all, who knew? – or it was too late.  He set up a punishing schedule of training too, working with both Ruby and Cas to spend as much time developing his brain as his body would allow.  His body too – that couldn’t be neglected.  He’d never really neglected it before, but now he put it through a regimen that would have made his father sit back and take notice.  Ruby didn’t entirely approve, although she had to admit that she liked the visual aspect of the results.  “You need to loosen up a little Sam,” she urged.  “Live a little.  See a movie.  Get a beer.  Get laid – I know you don’t want me anymore and I get it, I do.  But for crying out loud, try to think about something besides this job.  You’re going to turn into something worse than your father.”

“Ruby, every minute that I waste is time that Dean’s suffering in Hell.  Don’t you wish that someone had done that for you before you became a demon?” he pointed out.

She sighed and grabbed beers from the fridge.  It said a lot about how well Castiel had wormed his way into their lives in the two months that they’d known him, and about how well he’d adapted to passing as human, that she’d grabbed three beers and he hadn’t thought twice about accepting one.  “Well, I mean sure, it would have been nice.  I mean, I didn’t have Heaven looking out for me.  Not like Dean does.  And I didn’t have an awesome brother working to get me out.  But you’re literally turning yourself into something… not-alive.”

Both Sam and Cas froze.  “Sam’s abilities don’t make him a monster,” the angel frowned, his beer halfway to his lips.

“That’s not what I’m saying.  Even a monster is alive.  It has needs, urges.  I mean, one of us has to force you to eat or sleep, and I honestly think that we could put a giant plate of dogshit in front of you and you’d probably get as much out of it as you do from the actual food you eat.  How long has it been since you’ve actually looked at a girl?  Or a guy?”  She offered a wry grin.  “Yeah.  I knew.  Plenty of us knew.  I mean for crying out loud, we sent a male crossroads demon.”

He snorted.  “Yeah, well, if my brother hadn’t just died I’d have thought about it.  And, you know, if he wasn’t possessed.  He was kind of hot.”

“You go for the dark-haired types, don’t you?”

He shrugged, trying not to look at Cas as the angel turned his gaze to him.  “Look, it’s been a long time since… I mean, before Dean’s deal.  Before Cold Oak.  Since I really thought about it.  It’s not important.  It might be something to think about after we save Dean, I don’t know, but until then it doesn’t matter.”

“You are a person, Sam,” Cas told him, putting a hand on his arm.  “You are not a weapon.  You have more worth than that, and you mustn’t reduce yourself to a weapon.  A weapon exists to be used, and you don’t know who will want to use you if you succeed in that quest.”

Both Sam and Ruby raised an eyebrow at that.  “You mean like Heaven wanting Dean pulled out of Hell for its own reasons?” the latter challenged while Sam took a sip of his beer.  “I mean, don’t get me wrong.  Once I got over you taking my choice away from me and marking me for all time as a traitor against my own kind, I’m kind of glad to be working against Lilith.  I’ve always had a thing for tall antichrists.  But yeah.  You’re not exactly here because of your deep abiding love for Sam yourself.”

Castiel shifted.  “I did not know Sam when I arrived.  My orders are my orders,” he admitted.  “They happen to have come to coincide with my personal preferences.  I don’t know Dean, but Sam loves his brother and believes that he deserves to be saved.  I want to help him save his brother.”   The word “want” came out with a momentary pause, like that type of expression was so far outside the realm of his own understanding that he couldn’t quite wrap his head around the concept of personal preference.  Sam thought that maybe he couldn’t.

Ruby glanced from man to man.  “Interesting.  Well, these are the last three beers.  I’m going on a run for more.  Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Sam frowned.  “You wanted to sacrifice a virgin.”

“I didn’t say that was a long list.”  She grabbed her purse and keys and disappeared, leaving Sam alone with Castiel.

They sat in terribly awkward silence for a good minute, two men and their beer.  Finally Cas spoke.  “Possession is a major issue for you, is it not?”

“Of course it is, Cas.  I’ve been possessed.  It’s… I mean, your body, your soul – everything, it’s all stolen from you.”  He sipped from his beer.  He risked a glance at the angel.

“You are willing to work with demons, though, even though they are possessing people.”

“A necessary evil,” he admitted.  “I asked Ruby to release the last person she possessed and take the current host, who was brain-dead.  If that makes any sense.”

“So that any sexual activities didn’t take place against the will of the host.”  Cas nodded.  “I see.”

“When I was possessed, that was one of the things Meg liked to do to make me unhappy – go out and screw around because she knew I wouldn’t want it.  Didn’t want it.”  He shrugged.  “Being possessed sucks, Cas.”

“An angel cannot take a vessel that does not have its mind and soul,” his companion intoned.  “But Jimmy, he did give his full consent to this.  If it would make you feel more comfortable, you may speak with him.  Briefly,” he warned when he saw Sam’s face.  “It is difficult for him to stay conscious.”

“If it’s okay with you, yeah.  I’d like that.”  He nodded, leaning forward.

Cas closed his eyes briefly and pulled his grace inward.  After a second he changed.  His whole demeanor – the set of his shoulders, the light in his eyes, the way his fingers twitched – clearly indicated that this was not Castiel.  He looked up at Sam and winced.  “You must be Sam Winchester.”  Even his voice was different.  “Jimmy Novak.”  He held out a hand.

Sam shook it.  He could feel the pain radiating off this man but it didn’t seem to be anything Cas was doing to him consciously.  “Are you okay?”

“Being an angelic vessel – it’s a lot like being chained to a comet,” he grimaced.  “Usually he keeps me locked down in a dream.  I don’t feel it – it’s like being under anesthesia.  I gave my permission, for the record.  We talk sometimes, when you’re asleep.  He’s pretty impressed by you.  I guess you’re pretty devoted to your brother.”

“I don’t know about that.  I’m just doing what any brother would do.  I’ll try to keep it brief, though.  I can tell that this really doesn’t feel good.  Are you okay with this?  With everything Cas is doing?  With everything he might do?”

Jimmy chuckled.  “I gave up my right to the body when I said ‘yes.’  But I trust Castiel.  If there’s something he wants to do with our body, then I’m okay with it.  I don’t care.  I won’t even know about it, but I’m okay with it.  Even if it’s something I probably wouldn’t have done with it myself.  He’s a good guy.  He wouldn’t use it for something I’d consider immoral.”

“What if he… what if he were to decide he were the most promiscuous angel ever?  Or that he were into tattoos or something?”

“As long as everyone involved is consenting.”  Jimmy shrugged and groaned.  “Look, I’m sorry.  You seem like a nice enough guy.  It’s just that I’m kind of straining to hold a ball of energy the size of the Chrysler building in a six foot sack of skin, and well, that’s not easy.”

“Sorry, man.  Thanks for talking with me.”  He shook the vessel’s hand again, more gently this time, and Castiel returned.

“You are satisfied that Jimmy is content?”

“Yeah.  Thanks, Cas.”

He smiled gently.  “I am glad that I could set your mind at ease.”

Their eyes met, and Sam ‘s breath caught for a moment.  It would be so easy to just lean over and kiss him – but that would be stupid.  It was wrong to even think of that, wrong to think of himself while Dean was burning in Hell, wrong to think that he was worthy to kiss an angel no matter where Dean was.  Wrong to think that Cas would want him to.  The guy didn’t even know what a kiss was, he’d been a wavelength of light until two months ago.  “So,” he said, clearing his throat and looking away.  “Zille thinks that we’ve got some problems coming up in Idabel.  Bunch of cattle mutilations, weird deaths, storms.  That kind of things.  Could be good, right?”

“We can head that way tomorrow if you wish.”  Cas still had that strangely gentle smile on his face.  “For now it’s late.  You should sleep.  You’ve had a hard day.”

Sam wanted to balk.  After all, however difficult his day had been his brother’s day had assuredly been worse.  Still, he needed to be stronger if he were going to help Dean, and that wasn’t going to happen if he ran himself into the ground.  He went to bed, waking early to continue with his training.

Cas was not in the room when he woke, but that was not necessarily unusual.  Sometimes the guy liked to go out and look at the world, enjoy his Father’s creation.  Sometimes he liked to observe humanity and sometimes he needed to go and communicate with his brethren.  He hadn’t given Ruby any indication as to which of the above was the case this time and she hadn’t asked, so Sam went for his usual run.

When he returned, he found Cas as focused and intense as he had been the day that they met.  “Sam,” he said, gripping the hunter’s arms tightly.  “It is time.  We cannot wait any longer.  We must mount our assault on Hell now.”

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Cas descend into Hell.

Sam called Zille and Pete while Ruby called the rest of their allies from the field.  Their best plan, everyone agreed, was to go in through the Devil’s Gate in Wyoming, a twenty-seven hour drive from their present location in Vicksburg.  Dean would have an absolute cow if he knew that Sam was allowing Ruby to drive the Impala, but Sam would deal with that when they survived the Harrowing.  Their allies would not be joining them in Hell, not this time around.  Sam knew that he lacked the strength to go against Lilith right now, although he dearly wanted to.  This job was about Dean - not so much a fight but an extraction.  No, the allies would track the movements of other demons and fight them if need be.  Even Ruby would not venture into the Pit this time around.  Her cover was still intact and would remain so. The ultimate fight against Lilith would come later.

They booked a motel room for the night when they arrived in town.  Sam objected; whatever had spooked Castiel so thoroughly couldn’t be good for his brother.  Still, this was going to be his last opportunity for comfort for a while, as Cas explained.  “Time does not move in Hell as it does on Earth,” he explained.  “It’s different of course depending on where in Hell you are; the Cage is vastly different from the rest of Hell.  But in the rest of the Pit an hour is roughly equivalent to five days.” 

Sam did the math quickly in his head.  “So you’re saying that a month up here is about a decade down there?”

Cas nodded.  “We will need to move quickly.  You needn’t worry about ageing or anything like that, not physically.  I don’t anticipate that we’ll be there that long.  But I do not wish to be there any longer than necessary.  And you will need to be as well rested as you can be, mentally.  This will be very difficult for you, on a number of levels.” 

He sighed.  “Nothing can be more ‘difficult’ than losing Dean.” 

“You never know what’s to come, Sam.  Nevertheless, this is a dangerous mission.  We don’t know what we’ll find when we get there.  We can both be harmed and even killed by demons, and by the human souls on their way to becoming demons.” 

He shrugged.  “If that happens, your people will send in plan B, right?  A garrison of angels to free Dean?”

Cas hesitated.  “Yes, they will.” 

“All right.  If it looks bad, you get yourself out.  It’s not even a question, okay?  Dean is the priority.” 

“Of course.”  The angel sighed.  “I wish…”

“You wish what?”  He looked up from the crudely drawn map Ruby had given them.  “You had more backup than me?  Because I’ve got to say, I’m kind of wishing there were a few more demon-fighters coming with us on this one myself.”  Preferably demon-fighters who actually knew what they were doing, and maybe knew their way around Hell too.

“No.”  Cas’ vehemence startled Sam, sent his hair into his face.  The angel stepped forward into Sam’s space and hauled him to his feet.  “I wish you understood your importance, Sam.”

They were too close, too near to each other.  “I’m a weapon, Cas.  I’ve always been.  It’s okay.  It’s time to stop fighting it.” 

“No, Sam.  You’re so much more.”  He leaned forward and claimed Sam’s mouth with his own. 

For a moment Sam’s shock paralyzed him.  What the Hell did an angel even know about kissing at all?  Apparently this one had learned from somewhere, because those full lips definitely had a lot going for them.  Sam’s brain and body finally got onto the same page and he brought his hands up to cradle Castiel’s face, chasing after the kiss like it might be the last he ever got.  Hey, it might be.  And Castiel, well, Cas believed in him, didn’t he?  Cas valued him, not his powers, not his family connection, not just his brother.  Cas didn’t think he was just demon-blooded trash.  Cas was goodness, and light, and was helping him.  Cas was pure, and didn’t think that a thing like Sam would sully him. 

When Sam risked darting his tongue out to taste the angel’s mouth his partner took it in eagerly.  He tasted oddly clean, like rain smelled, and a bit like fresh roses.  He couldn’t get enough of the flavor, only breaking the kiss when he started to see stars from lack of oxygen.  “Was that your first kiss?” he gasped. 

“Yes,” Cas admitted.  “Was it adequate?”

“More than,” Sam replied fervently, stifling a chuckle.  He didn’t want to ruin the experience by making the guy feel like he was being laughed at, especially when there was no reason for him to feel that way at all. 

He frowned.  “I found it enjoyable, but it made me unpleasantly warm.”

He had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing.  “If you wanted to you could take off the trench coat.” 

Dark eyebrows drew together.  “But what if I continued to grow warm? Would I then need to remove more clothing?”

Sam sobered.  This guy hadn’t even had a body three months ago.  Maybe he was a natural talent but this was a lot – it was too much.  “I wouldn’t ask you to.”

He paused.  “And if I wanted to?”

Sam swallowed.  “I wouldn’t stop you.  If you were sure that’s what you wanted.  But I thought angels didn’t…”

“It is not an obligation,” he replied.  “There is no… no kind of regulation stating that we cannot enjoy sexual acts if we so choose under most circumstances.”  He put his hand on Sam’s chest, gently.  “There may not be another opportunity.  And I have grown very fond of you, Sam Winchester.” 

Sam kissed him this time, gently before letting Cas heat things up at his own pace.  The angel did indeed remove his trench coat, and his suit jacket, and his dress shirt, and his shoes and socks.  He glowered at Sam’s clothes, which reappeared in a neatly folded pile on a chair in the corner.  Sam had not yet discovered a gift for teleportation, so he had to help his partner with his remaining garments.  This was okay; it gave him an opportunity to touch, to kiss.  Castiel gasped when his lips gently touched his half-hard cock.  “Too much?” Sam apologized, backing off.

The angel grabbed his head.  “No,” he ground out.  “Just… surprising.  Pleasant, just… startling.”  And indeed, his body did seem to be pretty enthusiastic about even that light touch.  “Please…” 

Sam smiled.  He had something he could offer this divine person, who was about to risk everything for him and for Dean.  He guided Cas over to a seat on the bed, mostly for comfort, dropped to the ground and took him into his mouth.  It seemed like a small thing to offer, paltry payment for everything he’d done and everything he might yet do, but if the sounds he was already making were anything to go by he certainly seemed to be getting something out of it. 

Cas let go of his hair when he finished his release.  “I have never experienced anything quite like that,” he said, eyes on Sam as the taller man stood up. 

“You’ve had a physical body for all of three months, Cas,” he chuckled.  “I wouldn’t imagine so.” 

Of course Cas was able to stand up after that.  Sam could remember his first orgasm.  He’d been unable to move for several minutes, absolutely certain that Ben Taylor had cast some sort of paralysis spell on him and he hadn’t cared one little bit.  Cas wasn’t human, though, and he wasn’t whatever kind of trash Sam was.  He was an angel, and apparently there wasn’t an Enochian word for “refractory period.”  Arms encircled Sam’s waist.  “Will you come to bed?” 

He raised his eyebrow.  “Are you sure you want that, Cas?” 

“I’m certain, Sam.”  He ran a hand over Sam’s pecs.  “I want you to make love to me.” 

Sam took a deep breath.  “It’s a big step.”

“If not now, when?”

He kissed the angel again and fished the lube out of his duffel.  “I’ll make this good for you, Cas,” he promised.  And he did.  He took his time with prep, making sure not only that Cas was technically ready to accommodate his (admittedly proportional) size but that he thoroughly enjoyed the process and actively begged for more.  When he entered his lover finally there was some initial discomfort – that was only natural – but Sam made sure to distract him with plenty of attention and stimulation until he was entirely ready to proceed.  He made sure that Cas came first, succumbing to the dual ministration of Sam being able to find his prostate with reasonable accuracy and Sam’s careful attention to the angel’s cock, awake again and throbbing between them until Sam took it in his large hand and gave it the attention it so thoroughly deserved.  Only once their chests were sticky with grace-charged cum did Sam allow himself to finish, pumping his own release into the beautiful creature who gazed in awe up at him. 

“We should clean up,” Sam offered, rolling off Cas after a moment.

Cas snorted, and they were both as clean as if they had showered.  “Angels don’t get dirty, Sam.”  He leaned in and kissed Sam thoroughly.  “Thank you.”

The hunter blinked.  He had put that look on Cas’ face – himself, simply by showing him a good time.  He’d given him physical pleasure, hopefully something more.  “Thank you, Cas.  You’re amazing.” 

Cas held him while he fell asleep, and he held Cas.  It never even occurred to Sam that the sheets were clean too.  In fact, there was no physical evidence that they’d had sex at all. 

They woke the next morning and dressed with none of the awkwardness of some first-time mornings after he’d survived.  They met Ruby and the others at a diner not too far from the Devil’s Gate.  There were a few civilians there and Sam had to wonder – did any of them suspect that they were in fact surrounded by inhuman creatures from Hell?  They seemed oblivious, going about their business like today wasn’t any different from any other day.  Ruby smirked when they joined her at the table.  “Finally,” she muttered, and passed him a plate of eggs. 

“Shut up,” he muttered without much heat, cheeks pinking up.  “Let’s do this.  Everyone know their role?”

“We run distraction,” Zille confirmed, nodding.  She stood out here, in rural Wyoming.  It didn’t seem to bother her any, but then again if someone gave her any trouble she could rip his heart out of his ribcage and eat it.  That probably went a long way toward her willingness to cope with racists.  “You and your friend here go in, make the extraction and get out.  You’ll let us know when you’re clear.” 

“Sam,” Cas said then, “There’s something you need to know.  You’ll be in Hell – actual Hell.” 

“Yeah, Cas.  I’m aware.”

“You can’t exorcise demons if you’re in Hell.”  He met Sam’s eyes squarely.  “You’ll have to actually kill them.”

Sam frowned.  “I… I mean, I can do that with the knife, but then Ruby’s unprotected.” 

She sneered.  “Aw, chivalry.”

Pete threw a home fry at her.  “He’s a prince, not a knight.” 

She shrugged.  “Meh.  Close enough.”

“You can do it readily enough with your mind, Sam.  And you’ll need to be able to let yourself really go – shine through as who you really are.”  Cas sighed.  “No hiding, no holding yourself back.  Remember, it’s all for your brother.”  He reached out and put his hands over Sam’s.  “There is no shame in who you are, in what you are.  It’s a fact, pure and simple.  We would not have loved each other if there were.” 

No one laughed.  Whether that was because no one dared or because they actually didn’t think the angel was wrong Sam couldn’t tell.  “Yeah.  Okay, Cas.  You’re right.”  He cleared his throat and drank some coffee to hide his discomfort.  “Let’s make this happen.  Every minute we wait is a longer time Dean has to wait down there, right?”

The three of them drove out to the Devil’s Gate.  It had been a long time since Sam had been here and gunned down Jake Talley.  Part of him felt bad about that.  Most of him did not.  The guy had murdered him after all, in front of Dean.  The guy had driven Dean to make that idiotic deal.  The guy had thrown his lot in with Azazel.  The ground had absorbed the bloodstains now.  And this was the place that had seen his father escape Hell, dismissing him with nothing but a cold nod.  He felt his hands shaking.  He didn’t need John Winchester’s approval.  He never had.  It would have been nice to have, sure, but the time for that was long gone.  He’d have been disgusted by what Sam had become, but Sam had an angel of the Lord that believed in him and loved – well, approved of him, didn’t condemn him.  “Whatever happened to my father’s soul?” he asked as they stared at the mausoleum that held the Gate.

“I’m not certain,” Cas told him.  “He escaped Hell, but Heaven was barred to him.” 

Sam snorted.  So much for John’s self-image.  “Okay.  Well, here goes nothing I guess.”  He paused.  “Wait a minute.  We don’t have the colt.  How are we supposed to do this?”

“You’ve awakened enough of your nature, and the seal on the gate was broken once already.  The combination of factors should be sufficient.  Just relax, open your mind and bid the gate to open.” 

Bid the gate to open.  Right.  This was no fairy tale.  If anything his life was more of a dark fantasy or horror story than anything else.  Still, the angel hadn’t steered him wrong yet.  He closed his eyes and forced himself to relax as much as he could, remembering that night in the field when he and Dean had set off the fireworks and almost burned it down.  He remembered last night, the feeling of being buried in an angel’s body and surrounded by an angel’s love.  Castiel believed in him; he could do this. Open.  He didn’t speak the word, just held out his hand and thought it.  For half a second there was nothing, and then the doors slowly swung open.

Beyond them was fire, and sulfur, and the screams of the damned.  It was impossible to differentiate one shriek from the next.  “We must be off,” Cas told him, taking his hand.  “It will be okay, Sam.”

They entered Hell together.  Nothing could have stopped Sam’s heart from speeding up, his lungs from gasping for the super-heated air.  This was Hell.  He’d known that this was his final destination since he was old enough to understand the idea of death, even though he’d fought against it just as long, and here he was.  He was going to burn, he was going to fry in the lake of fire and this was final, nothing to be done.  It was nothing less than he deserved of course, what with letting Dean die like that and being what he was but still, anyone would have panicked.  He felt the scream starting to well up in his throat and he bit down on his lip to hold it back.  Once he started screaming he would never stop.  No one did, not until they became a demon and he was halfway there already, wasn’t he? 

Cas kissed the blood on his lip away.  “Be calm,’ he whispered.  “Remember, you are here because you can be.  No other living man could walk here.  You are as much of this place as you are of earth.  Do not be afraid, Sam.” 

His heart slowed.  Down here he could see Cas’ wings, the outline of his true form against the shadows of the cavern.  He exhaled and straightened up.  There was no use in slouching here, no sense in trying to appear smaller than he was.  He was here on a mission, with an angel at his side.  He would succeed or die trying and that was simply all there was to it.  “Thanks, Cas.” 

They encountered no real resistance in the first day.  He felt a few tentative brushes against his mind from the shadows but they weren’t even sentient, not really.  He couldn’t call them real demons, more like demonic spirits – like the daevas, he supposed.  Hell, as near as Sam could tell, appeared to be a massive prison.  There were cages all around, and the cages were filled with people who screamed.  They walked a path that sloped downward, which only made sense.  After all, weren’t the deepest, lowest parts of the Pit reserved for the worst offenders? 

“You’ve been reading too much Dante,” Cas informed him when he commented on this fact.  “Each person perceives Hell differently, although I believe it is different for you because you are not a prisoner.  You’re... well, in a very real sense you’re imposing your own will over reality down here without actually knowing it.  It’s something I didn’t expect of you, not entirely, but I should not be surprised when I consider whose blood runs in your veins.”  He smiled gently. 

“What about all of these people, Cas?”  He glanced into one of the cages and shuddered away from the scene inside.  “Can we help them?”

“They’re damned souls, Sam.  What would you do with them?”  He shook his head gently.  “There isn’t anyplace for them.  This is the fate that they earned.” 

They walked on.  After the second day Sam noticed that he wasn’t getting tired.  He wasn’t getting hungry, either.  Maybe it was because his body was still attuned to earth time.  Maybe it was because the demonic side of his nature had precedence here, and demons didn’t sleep or eat unless they wanted to.  He didn’t ask about that, because he was pretty sure he didn’t want to know at the end of the day.  It didn’t matter, it just meant less time he had to spend doing insignificant crap and more time that he got to spend working for Dean.

They hit their first real resistance after about five days.  They’d just managed to get past the “light” level when they heard a vague growl from behind them.  Sam turned around and there they were.  Ten hellhounds, drooling and pawing at the ground.  “Shit,” he spat out.  He’d encountered hellhounds before, back in Greenwood and of course in New Harmony when they’d come for Dean.  He’d felt their hot, sulfurous breath on his skin.  But he’d never  seen them, and he’d never had to deal with so many. 

“I don’t think that they need to defecate on their native plane,” Cas commented. 

Sam rolled his eyes briefly as his lover pulled out a short, triangular blade from under his trench coat somewhere.  “I don’t know if we can fight them all,” he admitted.  “This might be a good time for you to make your escape and call on the feathery cavalry.” 

“No, Sam.  I will not abandon you to the hellhounds.” 

He remembered watching as Dean was torn to shreds, wishing that it could be him instead.  He was about to get his wish.  They charged in as one and Cas lashed out with his blade, silver flashing in the ever-present light of fire.  One yelped and went down even as another bit down on the angel’s arm. 

Sam had his own problems.  He had no weapon that would be even remotely effective on a hellhound, only himself.  Well, he’d decided to become a weapon, hadn’t he?  He reached out with his mind and grabbed onto one of the creatures and pulled.  On earth it was the way he would exorcise a demon from a living host.  Here, of course, there was nowhere for it to go.  Instead the fabric of the demon itself was torn, injuring it.  He pulled again and the hellhound was killed.

Of course while he was experimenting to get the pressure right another hellhound had latched onto his leg and still another had latched onto his side.   Pain, blue-hot and sharp, shot through the entire right side of his body as his brain grabbed at the one on his side and yanked.  This time he got through the creature with one blow, tearing through the next with barely a shift in thought.  It absolutely got easier with each attempt.

Cas stabbed out again and again.  Sam had enjoyed watching him fight in their time on the surface.  Down here he seemed even less fettered by petty things like physics.  While Sam’s brain shredded his own hellhounds Cas’ blade stabbed into them faster than the human eye could see.  He didn’t seem to notice the bites he took.  The entire fight lasted about ten minutes and in the end they found themselves standing in a pile of corpses that slowly faded into the ground itself.  Sam knew – how he knew, he didn’t care to contemplate – that Hell had simply re-absorbed the material that created them.  “You are injured.”  Cas looked at him, tilting his head to the side. 

“Maybe a little.”   He touched his hand to his side.  The adrenaline had kicked in and he didn’t feel the pain anymore.  He would eventually. 

“You’re bleeding heavily, Sam.  Let me heal the worst of it, at least.  I don’t want to draw attention if we don’t have to.”  He reached out and touched a hand to the bite on Sam’s side.  He felt a rush of coolness, a spring breeze on a nice day, and the pain dissipated.  The hand lingered, followed by a quizzical drawing of the brow.  “Did you… enjoy that, Sam?”

He felt his cheeks color up.  “It’s a normal reaction some guys have in a fight.  Although I do enjoy having your hand on me, so… maybe.”  He looked away.  “Not the time or place, I know.” 

The angel kissed him, deep and hard.  “Not here.  But later.  When he’s safe,” he promised, and they continued on.  Sam had expected to run into more demons in their travels, all things considered, but it was another week before they met any other demons.  How this was possible Sam didn’t know.  Castiel shone brightly on Earth, he should be standing out like a goddamn lighthouse down here.  “I am dimming myself,” he admitted when Sam called him on it.

Of course they had to meet a demon eventually, and when they did she was more than a little bit familiar.  “Well well well,” she greeted.  Meg on Earth chose petite host bodies for some reason – Sam thought it probably had something to do with getting people to underestimate her, but he hadn’t gleaned all that much during his time as a guest in his own body.  Meg in her true form was actually beautiful, in a terrifying and frankly kind of grotesque way.  She had horns like a bighorn sheep, curling down the side of her head like a helmet, and striped scales for her skin.  “If it isn’t my wayward baby brother.  I figured you’d make it down here sooner or later but I’ve got to say, Sammy boy, this isn’t the way I thought I’d get to see you.”  She gestured, and a hellhound appeared on either side of her.  “I mean, I figured I’d get to have my way with you for a few centuries before you started walking around here like you belonged or something.” 

“Meg,” he greeted.  He barely trusted himself with that much.  “Are you going to try to stop me?”

“That depends.  Who’s your friend?  I like the looks of him.  The hair’s nice.  Oh, and the wings.  The last time we got an angel down below was, oh, five thousand years Earth time?  He’s still here you know.  It’s been a little longer for him but I’m sure he’d welcome the company.”  She grinned, revealing a full set of jagged teeth like broken glass.   

“We are not here to see Lucifer,” Castiel informed her.  “We are here to retrieve the soul of Dean Winchester.  Do you know where he’s being kept?”

She raised an eyebrow.  “Pretty boy don’t mess around, I guess.  I like.  Simple.  Direct.  To the point.  Then again, Sammy, you’ve always had a certain preference for blunt, haven’t you?  Brady.  Jess.  Madison.  None of them really pulled any punches, did they?  Yeah, Clarence.  I know where he’s being held.”

“Do you intend on telling us?” Castiel demanded then, after a moment’s silence in which she smirked, Cas stared and Sam wondered if a hellhound took kindly to having the place behind its ears scratched. 

“Why would I do that?” she drawled.  “Dean’s the last one to exorcise me and send me back here.  Why would I want to help you help him?”  She snorted. 

“Because if he stays any longer he’ll be a demon,” Sam tried.  “Do you really want a guy like my brother running around as a demon?  Even you have to know he’d be a nightmare.”

She shrugged.  “He’d have wound up as one sooner or later.”

“His place in Heaven is assured,” Cas intoned.  “He does not belong here.”

She snorted.  “That’s what you think, bright eyes.  Have you met the guy?  Have you seen him lately?  This is Hell, baby.  You don’t come here if you don’t belong here.” 

“He sold his soul, Meg.  It’s not like he got here for his sins,” Sam objected. 

“Doesn’t matter.  You think I got here for mine?  I came for the same reasons you will.  My blood damned me.  I was part of one of Azazel’s earliest generations.  Little Miss Ruby?  Turned to witchcraft to find a way to keep the plague from killing her family.  Intentions don’t matter.  You don’t find your way here by accident.”  She shook her head.  “And you think you’re just going to waltz on out of here with him, huh?”

“It is the preferred option, yes.”  Cas nodded, meeting her eyes.  “One way or another Dean Winchester will be saved.”

“And what makes him so special, huh?” she spat.  “Why couldn’t I be saved when I was a frightened little girl?  Why not Ruby, or any of these others?  Why only Dean Fucking Winchester?” 

“Because he is the Righteous Man.  It is ordained by God.  This must happen.”  He sighed.  “I would prefer that no more aggressive methods need be used and that the extraction be performed with as little risk to Sam or Dean as possible.”

“What do you care about what happens to Sammy?  He’s just half-demon trash.  You’ll throw him away once you’re done with him.”  She smirked. 

“Dean will need Sam, just as Sam needs Dean.  The world needs them both.”  Cas frowned.  “Do you intend to offer assistance or do you intend to obstruct us long enough for some kind of backup to swoop in and save the day?”

She laughed.  “Good one.  Dean is three levels above the throne room.  There is a staircase behind you that goes directly to that level.”  She gestured, revealing a door.  “It should take you about a month to get there.” 

“A month?”  Sam’s heart sank.

“You’d rather it take six years, hotshot?  Get going.  I’m not a fan of Lilith, so I’m not about to sell you out, but there are others who know about that passage and they will find you.  Expect a few fights, less than you’d have on the main drag.”   Castiel disappeared into the stairwell, but she grabbed Sam’s shoulder.  “Hey.  Listen up for a second.”      

He paused.  “What is it?”

“Listen.  I know we’ve had our differences –“

“You mean like you stealing my body, using it to go fuck your way through Minnesota like it was nothing, trying to rape one of the few pseudo-friends I had left and oh yeah shooting my brother?”

She considered.  “Among other things, but yeah.  That’s a good start.  Look.  Watch your back, Sammy.  I mean it.  We’re demons.  We’re supposed to be lying, cheating backstabbers.”

He tried not to flinch at the plural there, to pretend that she was referring to the others down here in Hell or the small army he was building topside.  He couldn’t deny that he felt different here, after all.  “And?”

“That doesn’t mean other people aren’t, Sam.  Don’t get caught up in old-fashioned ideas that were written down by the winning side in the first place.”  She leaned forward and kissed his forehead, much closer to his size here in her true form.  “Good luck, Sammy.  You’re going to need it.” 

“Thanks, Meg?”  She was gone before he even got the words out, and he didn’t waste time wondering where she’d gone.  He ducked into the hidden passageway and caught up to Cas.

“That is the demon who possessed you, correct?” his lover demanded.

“Yeah.  Yeah, she is.  She’s also Azazel’s daughter, so.  I guess she sees us connected somehow.”  He shrugged.  “It’s creepy.  I try not to think about it.  I don’t remember much from the possession and what I do remember I kind of wish I didn’t, you know?”

“No.  I do not know.  But I cannot be possessed, I am the one possessing so I suppose that I cannot know.”  He sighed.  “She seemed concerned for your welfare.” 

“We were on friendly terms before I wrecked her altar and got her daevas to chuck her host body through a window.  Didn’t know she was possessed at the time of course, so the poor host died after we exorcised her.  After I exorcised her,” he amended.  “I killed her.” 

“Meg killed her,” Cas corrected him.  “The possession probably would have resulted in her death anyway.  You cannot save everyone, Sam.” 

They did encounter other demons after about a week and a half.  There were three of them and they came from below.  Sam managed to kill one of them quickly, but the one behind him got lucky and choked Sam nearly unconscious until he managed to get a grip of him and shred his essence to pieces.  He was more difficult to harm – probably an older demon, more powerful.  “How do you feel down here, Sam?” Castiel wanted to know after he stabbed the third demon. 

“Well, I’ll never need another decongestant,” he commented.  “It reeks of sulfur.” 

“That’s not what I meant.  We know that you need neither sleep nor food while you’re here.  What about headaches from the use of your ability?  Are you finding it more or less difficult to access your powers while you’re here or is it about the same?”

He considered as he tried to get his breath back.  “I don’t know.  Easier, maybe.  I’m not getting the headaches and it seems more… I don’t know, natural?  I mean, I know nothing’s natural about what I can do, but it doesn’t feel like I’m fighting myself if that makes more sense.”

“Good.”  He kept a hand on Sam’s back until he was able to move again. 

As an experiment, Sam stilled and extended his consciousness through the stairway.  For a moment he felt like an absolute ass, standing there with a sore neck and nothing to show for it.  Then he began to notice other forms, sensations that might have been a week out.  “Daevas, maybe?  About… a week ahead,” he guessed.  “Haven’t noticed us yet.”  On a hunch, he decided to try something new.  He focused on the monsters and strained, willing himself to move to the shadow creatures’ location.  This did hurt.  The sensation, if he had to describe it, was like pulling all of his own skin through an opening the size of a wedding ring, all at once. 

But it worked.  He allowed himself a millisecond of triumph.  The downside of his success was that he now found himself deep in a darkened passage surrounded by shadow demons with razor-sharp claws, already dazed from pain and a killer headache.  He lashed out with his mind, shredding the first creature he could get his mental hands on and moving on to the second.

Castiel appeared beside him, slashing with his blade.  Claws raked across Sam’s torso as he tore up another of the creatures and he sagged against the wall for support.  “What were you thinking?” the angel demanded when the last of the monsters had been dispatched.  He grabbed Sam by the remains of his shirts.  “You idiot!  You were almost killed!”

“I wanted to see if I could do it,” he admitted lamely, holding his head.  “I figured that if we could move this along Dean wouldn’t need to wait so long, wouldn’t need to suffer as long.  Is that such a bad thing?”

“If it gets you killed then yes, Sam.  It is such a bad thing.”  He smashed his lips up against Sam’s, harsh and demanding.  “What would I have done if I had lost you down here, Sam?”

“You’d have gotten your angel army to come find my brother,” he pointed out, stroking his lover’s face.  Cas’ cheeks never grew stubble; one of the benefits of being an angel, he supposed.  Of course, Sam wasn’t exactly growing a beard down here either.  “He’s the whole reason we’re down here in the first place, remember?  I’m not important, Cas.” 

“And if Dean returns to life and learns that you’ve gotten yourself killed doing something incredibly, thoughtlessly, preposterously stupid?”  Sam did not find himself permitted to answer, only to kiss.  He was okay with that. 

Now that Sam had an idea of how to teleport, though, the process was smoother.  Of course the problem was that he couldn’t exactly teleport to places he didn’t know.   That was how it worked.  On Earth Castiel could teleport anywhere just because he’d been around since the beginning, he’d been just about everywhere but even he’d never been to Hell before.  If he had a target, though, he could aim for that target and Castiel could aim for him.  The problem was that the target usually wound up involving combat.  Still, a little bit of a fight was worth it to cut down on the time it would take to save Dean.  They’d already saved a week. 

He scanned ahead again once he got over his headache and found a demon four days ahead.  That one he didn’t even need Cas’ help to take care of.  They walked along for another three days before Sam found more hellhounds another week in front of them.  Just like that they’d cut a month’s hike down the stairs to ten days all told.  It still wasn’t the best way to spend ten days of one’s life, but it was worth it for Dean.  All of it was for Dean.

And of course there was Castiel.  Cas had cared that Sam was risking his life, and not in the way that Dean cared that Sam was risking his life either.  Cas cared that Sam was risking his life, or at least he said he did, because he cared about Sam.  There was no stupid “got to look after my little brother” crap, programming that couldn’t even give Sam a name of his own or acknowledge that Sam was a separate person.  There weren’t any “family” addendums or riders.  For the first time since Jess Sam felt like he mattered to someone for his own sake, in his own right.  Like he had a right to exist simply as himself instead of as “Dean’s little brother” or “the youngest Winchester” or “the bad son.”  He was Sam, and he was good, and what he was and what he did wasn’t evil no matter where it came from.  Someone believed in him for himself. 

And the fact that the “someone” was Castiel – well, that was just icing on the cake.  Cas might not be savvy with the social graces but he was cunning, and he was smart, and he could fight in his own right and didn’t need protecting from much.  He could teach Sam a lot, and he could learn from Sam in other ways.  If this whole thing didn’t kill them maybe – of course, he couldn’t get ahead of himself.  Maybe Cas didn’t want anything beyond the end of this mission.  Maybe it wouldn’t be allowed.  Who knew how Heaven felt about long-term relationships?  Who knew how Cas felt about long-term relationships?  By what right did Sam even remotely consider himself to be worthy of anything of the sort? 

They got to the bottom of the staircase to find another corridor of cells, seemingly endless.  Sam let his mind open up.  There were demons on this level, but they were all engrossed in the cells.  The first level had mostly involved people’s minds torturing themselves.  Down here others were more active participants.  He glanced into the occasional cell and found that the territory within was not limited to the size of cell indicated by the doors outside.  Here, then, was the lake of fire in which a genocidal asshole found himself immersed, dodging balls of pitched tossed by demons in the guise of those he’d tried to advance in life.  Here was the place where another sinner found himself flayed slowly, piece by piece. 

Sam looked into a third cell and found a familiar face.  “Bela?” he whispered.  She was naked, strung up on a system of racks that disappeared into vast black smoke.  The hooks dug into her very meat.  She was alone, and she lifted her head up at the sound of his voice.

“Sam?” she said aloud, confused. 

He’d dreamed of her nude before.  Not naked, and certainly not like this.  The door to her cell opened at a touch and he rushed in.  The black smoke and heavy chains disappeared, replaced by a more typical dungeon.  When he laid his hands on her the rack fell away as well and she collapsed into his arms.  He gestured to Cas, who handed over his trench coat without complaint even though his glare pretty much defined disapproving.  “Bela,” he said again, aloud.  “I’m so sorry to see you like this.”

She groaned as she tried to straighten up.  “It is Hell,” she pointed out.  “I don’t suppose that you’re sorry enough to try to get me out of here?”

He sighed.  “You were trying to kill me.  But you were trying to get out of your own deal, Bela.  You didn’t deserve what was done to you that drove you to that deal, and you don’t deserve this.”  He gestured at the cell. 

“You… know?”  She looked away.

“Figured it out.  Made some connections since then.  Oh, and Dean told me some more before his time.  Bela, you didn’t deserve this.”  He sighed.  When he got out of here he didn’t think he was going to be able to eat for a month.   “This is my friend Castiel.  We’re here looking for Dean.” 

She flinched at the mention of the name.  “Well, you’ve come to the right place then.”  Even though she was obviously still in pain, and wounded, she was already starting to sound more like herself. 

“What do you mean?” he asked. 

“Well, this is the level where they send the hard cases.  The ones that are hardest to break.  I was on a higher level when I first arrived but apparently I wasn’t turning fast enough for Crowley – he thinks I’m going to become a crossroads demon.”

“Is that what you want?” Sam wanted to know, looking into her eyes.

“It’s Hell, Sam.  I don’t get a choice.  I’m just not about to make it easy for them.”  She snorted.  “I’ve been down here over thirty years now, close to thirty-five I think.  I’ll probably be good at it once I do turn.” 

“But do you want to be?” he persisted.

“Well, no.  I’m me.  A demon isn’t herself anymore.  I mean at least you, you get to keep your own body – I mean, what are you even doing here?  Are you actually dead?”

“What?  No.  We came to rescue Dean.”

She started to laugh then, a deep laugh that started somewhere in her gut and carried enough hysteria with it that Sam wondered if she’d finally lost her mind thanks to the torture.  “Oh, Sam.  You may be able to warp Hell to your pretty little will, but you’re obviously not on the right email lists are you?”

He sighed.  “Bela, I’m sorry for what’s happened to you.  And I’m going to help you.  I promise.”

“Sam –“ Cas began.

“Listen.  One way or another, I’m going to help you.  But I need for you to tell me where I can find Dean.  Okay?  Just tell me where I can find Dean and I promise you that one way or another I will help you to not turn into a demon.”  He held her eyes with his own. 

She kept laughing.  “If you really want to see Dean,” she gasped, “all you have to do is wait.”  She pulled open the trench coat, showing the wounds where she’d been secured to the rack.  “Who do you think made these?” 

He blinked and staggered back.  “What?  Dean’s not… Dean’s not a demon.”  He couldn’t believe that.  Not Dean – not his brother.  Not beautiful, pure Dean.  Not the good son.

“Not yet,” she confirmed.  “But he’s well on his way.  Alastair’s favorite apprentice, and let me tell you he’s learned a lot in a short time.”  She rubbed at a festering wound left behind by a particularly nasty hook. 

“No,” Sam whispered. 

“Bela,” Cas intoned.  “Are you willing to help us remove Dean from this situation?  He’ll no longer be in a position to harm you or any other soul in Hell.” 

She smirked.  “Oh, now, that’s not exactly a deal, is it?”

“Haven’t you had enough of deals?” he challenged, a glint to his eye.

“Bela, look.  Help us, and I’ll take you with us when we go.  I can’t resurrect you.  I don’t know where your body wound up and I don’t know how.  But… I know that my father’s soul escaped Hell, didn’t wind up back down here and didn’t go to Heaven.  I don’t know what happened to it, but it’s got to be better than this.  Right?  I’ll bring you back to Earth and you can see for yourself what happens if Heaven won’t take you.”  He glanced at Cas.  “Which it totally should because you’re helping with their business after all.”

“It is not for either of us,” his lover objected with what Dean would have called a bitchface, if he’d been here, “to determine which souls gain admittance to Heaven.”

“I’m just saying, someone might be able to put in a good word or something.  If anyone cares about that kind of thing.”  He made himself smile thinly.  “Does that seem reasonable, Bela?”

She smiled.  “Now that seems like the kind of deal I can live with.  Or, you know, not.” 

Sam’s heightened senses warned him of someone’s approach and he gestured to the others.  Bela took a seat in the corner.  She didn’t need to try to look terrified; her face paled and her entire body trembled when booted feet stopped outside the door.  Sam and Cas pressed themselves up against the wall on the opposite side from the door, which opened slowly. 

“Bela,” Dean’s voice greeted cheerfully.  Oh God, oh God, Sam thought.  He hadn’t heard that voice in months but it felt like centuries.  “Wait a minute – what the fuck?”  He looked around.  “What’s going on here?”

Sam made the door shut behind his brother and kept it shut.  That was Dean, alright.  Same face, same tattoo on his bare chest, same green eyes (still green, still green thank God) and same brass amulet resting on his chest.  “Hey Dean,” he greeted.  He eyed the rolling tray Dean had brought in, covered in knives and… other things.  Sam couldn’t put a name to some of them.  Others he could. 

“Sammy,” Dean gasped, and dropped the knife in his hand.  “What did you do?”

Cas stepped forward and grabbed Dean tight.  “Grab the girl, Sam!” he barked.  “Jump out of here now!”

Dean struggled against Cas, but the angel held him tight and flapped his wings.  Sam had no such trouble with Bela, who held on tight to Sam as he focused every ounce of his will on bringing him back to the Devil’s Gate.  It opened at his touch, and he and Bela’s ghost fell forward into Ruby’s strong arms. 

Bela smiled for a moment at him and kissed him once, chastely, on the lips before disappearing in the brightest ball of light he’d ever seen.  Ruby bundled Sam into the car.  “Wait!” He objected, struggling feebly against fatigue.  “I need to see Cas!”  But Cas wasn’t there, there was no sign of him.  Ruby drove him back to the hotel.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean is back from Hell, and nothing is the way Sam thought it would be.

Sam’s body – his human body – didn’t need to eat or sleep in Hell.  It had other ideas on the subject when he returned to Earth.  For Ruby six and a half hours had passed; for Sam it had been over a month and he needed a bed.  He needed a bed, he needed a shower and he wanted some water, not necessarily in that order.  The demon didn’t say anything when she buckled him into the passenger seat, but she passed him a pair of sunglasses even though the day was cloudy.  He accepted them wordlessly.  He would look when he got back to the motel. 

Once there he drank water until he thought he might burst.  Then he discarded his destroyed garments and scrubbed the soot, sulfur and blood from his body.  How was the blood real?  Well, the stuff that had come out of him, that was real and those wounds had scarred up nicely.  But how could Bela’s blood have stuck to his flesh?  She was a soul; her blood should have no hold here.  Same with the hellhounds, or the daeva…  Infernal physics was weird.  Hopefully he’d never have to go back.  He didn’t know who or what would replace Lilith when the time came, but it could be someone else’s problem.  Zille was a good candidate, she was smart and ruthless and funny.  Maybe Meg.  The thought should have been chilled him more than it did. 

Only once he’d used all the hot water did he look in the mirror.  He’d suspected in Hell, when Meg had been so quick to address him as “brother.”  He’d been resigned to it when Ruby had passed him the sunglasses.  Now he knew the truth.  His eyes had progressed from hazel to yellow.  His hand balled into a fist.  This had always been kind of inevitable, hadn’t it?  He’d had to let down the mental walls he’d built around the parts of him no one could like, and this was the result.  It was worth it, though.  At least, it was worth it if it had worked. 

Ruby stood in the doorway to the bathroom and smirked.  “You’re still not a demon, Sam.”  She passed him a towel.  “Look.  I get that you’re scared by the eye thing, but you were just in Hell.  Sleep on it.  Give yourself time to adjust, okay?  You’ll be able to turn them back.” 

It didn’t matter.  It didn’t matter what color his eyes were if Dean was alive to hate them, no longer suffering for his fuckup.  He’d known that there would be a price to pay; no one ever got anything for free, especially no one named Winchester.  “Yeah.  Okay.”  He staggered over to the bed.  “Let me know if anything important happens.”  He collapsed face-first onto the mattress and surrendered to the demands of his marrow-deep exhaustion, not even bothering to worry about why she was being so nice. 

He dreamed.  It was only natural that he should dream; dreams had been a primary aspect of Sam’s nightlife as far back as he could remember and nothing was going to change it now.  He dreamed of the screams of the damned, of the rack he’d seen Bela stretched out upon.  He dreamed of the hellhounds’ teeth sinking into his flesh.  He dreamed of his brother entering into that fetid cell not as a hero or savior but as a torturer, as a participant in Bela’s violation. 

But he also dreamed of Castiel.  He dreamed of the angel’s gentle touch.  He dreamed of those plump, soft lips on his own.  He dreamed that Cas’ round fingers touched his closed eyelids gently and he swore that he could hear his lover’s true voice telling him, “The color of your eyes doesn’t matter to me, Sam Winchester.  You saved your brother in that place.  You kept him from becoming a demon.  And you saved that woman’s damned soul.  She has been given a place in Heaven thanks to your effort.” 

He dreamed of the angel’s taste on his tongue.  He dreamed of the way Cas’ arms felt wrapped around him, the way his legs felt as his feet locked themselves behind his back.  He dreamed of the way it felt to be sheathed within him, entirely wrapped within the soothing coolness of Castiel’s body.  The dreams made a welcome contrast to the scorching fires of Hell, and he did not want them to end.

Two days later he woke anyway.  Somehow Ruby had managed to get him under the covers.  She lounged beside him reading a copy of Cosmo.  “I can’t believe that these people honestly think that a maxi dress looks good on anyone,” she complained.  “Literally everyone frowns when they wear one.  Everyone.  It’s a minor instrument of torture in jersey knit.”

He blinked.  “Okay?”  He didn’t think he could identify a maxi dress if someone aimed a gun at his head, but he supposed that no one was going to ask him to. 

“It’s a good thing you’re up,” she said.  “I was getting ready to go steal an IV line or something.”

He winced.  “Do you know anything about IVs?”

“Well, no, but I mean how hard can it be, Sam?”

“Good thing I’m awake,” he agreed, swinging his bare legs over the side of the bed.  “Any news?”

“There is no peace in the Middle East, stocks are down on news of corporate malfeasance and the Mets suck.” 

“So no.” 

“A guy in a fedora tried to hit on Zille at a bar in Kenosha.” 

He paused in his trek to the bathroom to grab some pants out of his duffel.  “How’d that go over?”

“Just fine with the right seasoning.” 

He shuddered.  He liked Zille, but he couldn’t pretend that she didn’t add a certain spice to his life that sometimes gave him heartburn.  “Right.”  He entered the bathroom for another shower.  When he emerged he noticed that after quite a bit of sleep his eyes had in fact returned to their natural color.  Dreams aside, he’d have been lying if he said there wasn’t at least a little bit of relief there.  “Any word about Dean or Castiel?” he asked as he came back out of the bathroom. 

Someone knocked at the door. 

Both Sam and Ruby reacted immediately.  Sam grabbed a gun from his nearby duffel.  Ruby grabbed her knife.  As Sam grabbed with his hand, he reached out with his mind.  Humans, two of them.  Well, that didn’t necessarily mean friends.  After all, hunters were human.  Gordon Walker had been human up until that last encounter. 

Ruby pulled the door open.  Bobby Singer and Dean stood on the other side.  Dean looked… well, he looked alive, was the best way to put it.  His eyes shimmered with unshed tears.  His lips curled into a smile, but they trembled too.  “Heya, Sammy,” he greeted in a raspy voice.  It must be from all the screaming, the part of Sam’s brain not busy trying not to cry diagnosed clinically. 

This was it.  This was everything.  It was everything Sam had worked for, everything Sam had sacrificed for, everything he’d trained for.  He bisected the room in three long strides and took his brother into his arms in the tightest hug since – well, since a very tight thing indeed.  “Dean,” he inhaled. 

Ruby cleared her throat.  “So are you two… together?” she suggested with a mischievous glint to her dark eyes.

Sam let go of Dean long enough to look at her.  “What?  No.  He’s my brother.”  When he got her alone, he was going to have to really give it to her about that one.  How long had she been waiting to use that line?  Seriously? 

“Oh.”  She widened her eyes artfully and grabbed her own duffel.  “I’ll, uh, I’ll catch up with you later.  Call me, Sam.”

“I will.  Cathy.”

“Kristi.”

“Sorry.” 

Bobby and Dean shouldered their way in.  “Ain’t you gonna test him, Sam?” the older man prodded, giving him a long look. 

“Don’t need to, Bobby.”  He glanced over at their sometime-mentor.  “I know it’s him.”  He smiled again and wrapped Dean up in his arms again. 

Dean patted him on the back.  “So how much was she?” he asked. 

“Who, Kristi?”  Dean nodded, grinning lasciviously.  Sam’s stomach turned, remembering Dean’s face when he’d entered Bela’s cell in Hell.  “I don’t pay, Dean.  She’s a hunter, that’s all.” 

“A hunter.  Uh huh.”  Bobby’s eyes narrowed.  “You always work with lady hunters without your shirt on?”

He looked down at the claw marks bisecting his chest.  “If I just got out of the shower then yeah.  I…  oh wait.  You probably want this back.”  He grabbed the amulet he’d pulled off his brother’s corpse and pulled it over his own head, handing it back to Dean. 

“T-thanks.”  Dean’s bravado crumbled for a moment, and then hardened again.  “But I wasn’t talking about the girl.  How much did it cost to bump me out of the hot box, huh?”

“What?”  Sam’s jaw worked up and down, but no further sound emerged. 

“Don’t act like Mr. Innocent.  That’s the only way this could’ve gone down, Sam.  I wanted to be saved but not like this!”

“You think I sold my soul –“  He cut himself off.  Dean didn’t know.  He didn’t remember.  He didn’t remember Sam and Cas coming to him in Hell.  “No.  I wanted to.  I tried, believe me.  There is nothing that I didn’t try.  I had nothing to offer.  Lilith didn’t want my soul.  She didn’t even want my head.  Guess she figured the way I was going on I’d get the job done soon enough anyway.”  He shrugged.  “So I’m sorry that I didn’t, Dean, but it wasn’t me.”  Not like that, anyway.  He thought he’d given up the notion of shame as it applied to his abilities, but somehow now looking into his brother’s hardened eyes he didn’t think that now was the right time to bring them up. 

“Okay.  Okay, Sammy.  I believe you.”  Dean folded his lips.  “But the question remains, if you didn’t, then what did?”

Sam got them a room with two double beds and left Bobby to the king-sized bed.  Then they knocked off to go get some dinner.  Sam hadn’t eaten since his return from Hell, not that anyone with him knew that.  Bobby watched him like a hawk.  Dean wasn’t much better.  “So what’s been going on with you, boy?” the former wanted to know once their meals had arrived.  “I haven’t heard hide nor hair of you since we buried your brother.” 

He looked away.  Funny how all the old shame came back like it had never been away, as though Cas hadn’t been there at all.  “Hunting.  Going after Lilith, trying to get some payback.”

The older hunter sneered.  Dean paled.  “What, alone?” Bobby snorted.  “Who do you think you are, your old man?”

Sam considered telling them that no, he’d actually assembled a team of demon rebels with the help of a hot angel.  Somehow he thought that would go over poorly.  “Sorry, Bobby.  I guess I just didn’t think you’d want in on it.”  It wasn’t like he and Bobby were close.  He knew Bobby tolerated him for Dean’s sake.  If Dean weren’t around, Bobby had no reason to tolerate him.  Was he starting to turn into John?  The thought scared him.  He’d been willing to sacrifice everything, even his humanity, to avenge Dean.  Of course, he had no dependents, no family, no anyone to be hurt by his decision. 

“Anyway,” he said, checking his phone, “It looks like there’s been some demon signs down by Cheyenne.”  He sent a silent thank you to Pete for that save.  “I was planning to check it out once I’d healed up a little.  You guys want to come with?” 

They grumbled.  Of course they grumbled.  Of course, there was no way that they were going to let Sam go off on his own either.  Who knew what the freak might do when left unsupervised?  Hell, he’d already gone and done God knew what for three months and change!  Sam bit back on the thought.  He’d just gotten Dean back.  He should be happy.  He was happy.   Of course he was.

He shot off a text to Ruby, Zille and Pete telling them that they needed to be discreet in terms of contact for a while until they’d figured out a way to let Dean know what was going on.  He was going to figure it out eventually, as even Ruby pointed out.  “He should find it out from you, Sam,” she sighed.  “If he finds out some other way he’s going to be pissed.”

He’d be pissed anyway.  He made that clear enough the next day, after making his feelings about the iPod jack known by ripping it out and throwing it into the backseat.  When he asked how Sam had managed to survive Lilith’s assault he seemed somehow less than thrilled to learn that Sam was somehow immune to the archdemon’s attack, and he asked point-blank if Sam had been using his powers. 

Sam couldn’t admit it.  Not when the tone was so accusing, so hostile, so angry.  And of course Dean didn’t believe him.  He was so screwed. 

They found a diner in Cheyenne with a handful of Lilith loyalists.  Dean believed that they had information about how he’d been freed from Hell.  He thought that some “high-level demon” busted him out and slapped the spokesdemon riding the waitress around.  He picked up on their fear – given what he’d gotten up to in Hell, that wasn’t surprising – but he completely missed the nervous glances toward Sam. 

Sam had wanted to go back and get rid of the demons, but Dean had been adamant that there were too many in the diner for two men to take care of alone.  Sam pointed out that there were only a few demons there, and he’d been killing a lot more than that recently, but Dean was having none of it.  “The smarter brother’s back in charge, Sammy,” he’d said as though that settled it. 

After Dean went to sleep that night Sam went back to the diner with Ruby and Pete.  The gashes across his chest still bled, but he wore a dark shirt to hide the bloodstains.  If no one had noticed the injuries when they’d been staring them in the face no one was going to notice a little bit of blood on a black shirt.  The Lilith loyalists did not know much about what had happened to bust Dean out, only that their Queen was angry at the loss and that she was planning something “exciting” for their near future.

Castiel joined them at the end of it.  The two demons grinned and left them to their reunion.  “I should have healed you back in Hell,” the angel told him without preamble, touching his fingers to Sam’s temple.  There was that cool spring breeze feeling again, the brief feeling of cleanliness, and then all of the persistent aches and burns of his itching and healing injuries disappeared.  “I am sorry.”

“Cas,” he breathed, gripping his lover’s forearms.  “You’re okay.”

The dark head tilted to the right.  “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You… I mean, you disappeared after we left, and I didn’t even know if you’d managed to get him out or if it was too much for you or what,” he exploded.  He looked into the angel’s eyes.  Was he reticent?  Maybe.  Maybe Sam was reading into things, based on his family’s behavior.  Was there affection?  Did Cas still care for him?  “I was worried about you.” 

“Restoring your brother to life was taxing,” he admitted, after a moment.  “I was forced to return to Heaven to restore my energy and receive orders.  An angel flopped in the corner staring into space is not terribly useful to you, I’m afraid.” 

“It’s not just about you being useful, Cas,” he chided.  “It’s about me caring for you.  You’ve been a good… friend.” 

“Your brother has found you, I take it?”  Cas stepped back, breaking physical contact. 

Sam blinked and stuck his hands in his pockets.  “Uh, yeah.  Yeah, he found me yesterday.  He, uh, he didn’t remember the extraction.”

“That’s not unexpected.  The return to one’s body upon resurrection is generally traumatic; the brain shies away from it.  You do not recall your own recall from death.” 

Sam considered.  “No, no I don’t.  I don’t even know where I went, or what afterlife I had.  If any.”

“That’s probably for the best.”  He grimaced.  “Is your brother aware that you have been using your abilities in his absence?”

“No.  I mean, he suspects, but he’s always suspicious of me.” 

Cas grunted slightly.  “And does he know about your sexual enjoyment of men?”

“Does he know I’m bisexual?  It’s never come up.”  He frowned.  “What’s going on, Cas?” 

“I have received new orders from my superiors, Sam.  Your brother is now my charge.”  Some of Sam’s confusion must have showed on his face, because he gave a thin smile.  “Heaven has work for him.  It is my responsibility to watch him.  Guide him.  Try to help him where it is permitted.  We’re entering into dangerous times.”

“So we’ll still be around each other,” Sam offered. 

“And if your brother is confronted suddenly with the fact that the angel that broke him out of Hell only did so with powers that…”

“That he hates,” Sam finished, feeling sick. 

“Or that said angel was in a sexual relationship with you…” he continued.

“I get it.  Thanks, Cas.”

“It’s not that I don’t want to continue our liaison, Sam.  It’s that these orders come from very high up.  It is vital to the safety of humanity that your brother’s faith be secured unto Heaven.  The world cannot afford for me to lose Dean’s confidence.  Not for the… feelings… of one angel.”

“And one half-demon freak.”  He pulled himself up to his full height, even if he couldn’t lift his head up.  “It’s okay.  I, uh.  I get it.  Thank you for all your help in getting Dean back.  Whatever happens from here out, at least he’s not suffering down there anymore.” 

“Sam –“

“I understand.  We’re strangers.  No hard feelings.”  He was lying, of course, but then again that was something he was used to.  He walked out of the diner and sent out a mass text to the demons: “Cut out the angel.”  His hand shook as he sent the text but that didn’t stop him from hitting send, not even for a moment.  After all, even Cas admitted they were heading into dangerous times.  He’d known that the man had his own agenda when he’d taken up with him. 

Dean was gone when he got back.  So was Bobby.  It was all for the best.  He didn’t need for them to see him like this.  He shouldn’t feel this broken inside.  He shouldn’t.  He had his brother back, and whatever the story being told to Dean might be he knew, in his heart, that he’d cleaned up his own damned mess.  That should be enough for him.  It needed to be enough for him. 

The next day they got back into their respective cars and drove back to Sioux Falls.  Sam should have objected to Dean driving for nine freaking hours with no stops, but he just didn’t have the heart.  Besides, the guy had just been sprung from Hell.  If he wanted to drive and listen to the same stupid Motorhead tape over and over, let him.  It had been over thirty years for him, after all.  They got back to Sioux Falls in time to have the house invaded by a bunch of ghosts – not just ghosts, but ghosts of people they couldn’t save.  Henricksen, for example, and the host body of Meg Masters.  They were the only ones who interacted with him.  Bobby was menaced by a pair of twin girls who he hadn’t managed to find in time.  Sam saved Bobby from that one.  It helped to counter Henricksen’s blame echoing in his head, about how he’d died in Sam’s stead.  If only he knew how much Sam wished it had been him.  How much better off everyone would have been.  Maybe then Dean wouldn’t have had to go to Hell at all.  And Meg – well, she hit it right on the nose, didn’t she?  After all, she’d been possessed.  She had every right to object to him palling around with a cohort of demons when their hosts were prisoners and unwilling witnesses to whatever their bodies were being made to do.  She didn’t know, she wouldn’t or couldn’t know, about Sam’s own experience.  About how Ruby had gone out and found an empty host, or about how Zille’s host actually seemed pretty content.  Sam didn’t enlighten her.  She wouldn’t have understood.  He wouldn’t have, not when he’d just been violated by the same demon that had used her. 

The whole incident turned out to be part of something out of an obscure part of Revelations, meaning that this was indeed the End of Days.  Castiel confirmed this in a nocturnal visitation to Dean later, after the things had been banished thanks to a spell Bobby just happened to have on hand, and who knew that Bobby kept opium as part of his well-stocked occult supply cabinet?  He tried not to be jealous about the visit.  Cas had made his intentions clear.  Dean was the one that mattered, and obviously if Heaven had gone through all the trouble of pulling a damned soul out of Hell (and allowing one of their own to consort with something like Sam Winchester to boot) then Dean mattered because whatever it was that Heaven needed him for involved the Apocalypse in some way.  It would be selfish of Sam to want to take that away from Dean.  The guy had been through enough; he deserved to be important.  He deserved to have what Cas had given Sam.  Dean got sent back in time, again by Castiel, to meet his parents and grandparents before John and Mary married.  He told Sam about it when he returned.  Of course, this meant that Dean now learned the secret that Sam had been hiding since Cold Oak: that Azazel had fed him his blood, changing Sam.  Sam would have rather have removed his own eyes than see the loathing and disgust in Dean’s, especially when he realized that Sam already knew.  Oh yeah – finding out that Sam had kept that a secret had gotten him a fist to the face.  It had a lot to do with why he hadn’t told Dean in the first place.  Learning about their mother’s deal had done a lot to Sam, too, and none of it was good.  Of course their mother’s deal had sealed his fate.  Naturally - how could it not have worked out that way?  Not that Dean’s opinion of Saint Mary of Winchester was even remotely tarnished by learning that she’d basically sold Sam out to the devil, not at all.  Sam tried not to let it hurt him that he’d been excluded from the trip in the first place.  After all, he wasn’t part of the family, not really.  It was probably not problematic for him to be angry with Castiel for letting Dean see that private shame of his though. Even though Dean was horrified by the thought that he’d been riding around all these years with someone contaminated by demon blood he still wanted to keep hunting with Sam, for reasons that the younger Winchester couldn’t really grasp. Sam, of course, had been conspiring with his infernal colleagues while Dean was taking his trip through the family archives.  This was the Apocalypse.  He didn’t have time for mourning, or for nursing his shame and his grief.  Maybe he wasn’t the Righteous Man or whatever, maybe he wasn’t Heaven’s chosen one, but he could make a contribution.  He’d proven that.  You didn’t have to be an angel, or even human, to want to do something about the Apocalypse or about Lilith.  Plenty of demons had something to lose from letting Lucifer rise and Lilith was the key to everything.  Sam could keep track of things, put out feelers, see what was going on. 

Not that he told Dean about any of this. If Dean had been hard to talk to before Hell, it was nothing compared to his sullenness now. Thirty plus years in the pit will do that to someone.  He insisted that he didn’t remember any of it, but Sam knew he was lying.  It wasn’t like he didn’t see the way that Dean sucked down bottle after bottle of liquor.  It wasn’t like he wasn’t awake for the nightmares, not that Sam and sleep had ever been better than nodding acquaintances. 

Of course things caught up to Sam as he’d known they must.  It was almost a relief when Dean – sneaking after him apparently at Castiel’s suggestion, with an address provided by the angel who had taught Sam to hold his head up – caught Sam exorcising a possessed man with Ruby in tow.  He reacted predictably.  He attacked Sam, who didn’t hit back.  He attacked Ruby, who did.  Sam separated them, getting a black eye from Dean for his trouble.  Ruby brought the victim to the ER.  Dean left and began packing his things, trashing the motel room and taking a couple more swings at Sam while he was at it.  Sam let him.  What was the point of fighting?  He forbade Sam from using his abilities, forbade him from seeing Ruby.

It would have been easy for Sam to tell the truth.  After all, Castiel had disclosed his deepest and darkest secret.  He’d then told Dean where to find out about Sam using the abilities he’d helped Sam learn to use, then had encouraged him not to share.  It would have been so easy to ruin all of the goodwill Cas was building with Dean.  But it would also have been wrong.  This was the Apocalypse.  If Dean was the guy to stop it, as Heaven thought, then he needed to let Cas hang him out to dry.  Whatever.  It wasn’t like he’d ever see Castiel again, even though Dean decided to stick around.  Instead, he said nothing.  Sam’s opportunity to “meet” the angels came on another job.  They showed up to investigate witches.  It turned out that this was no ordinary witch job – like witches were ever ordinary.  No, this was a Seal.  Cas was accompanied by another angel, Uriel.  This one’s grace was less blue, more maroon, and he did not like Sam one bit.  He sneered when Cas shook Sam’s hand, as though they were strangers, and made comments about Sam not using his powers.  Sam’s hackles rose, but he bit his cheek and held his temper in check. 

The angels wanted to destroy the town – well Uriel wanted to destroy it with Sam, which at least got a rise out of Dean.  That counted for something, right?  Dean still wanted to fight for him, if not with him?  They were granted some time to find the witch, which they did but not before his partner finished the incantation and summoned the demon, breaking the seal.  Sam wound up fighting the demon alone.  To be honest he tried fighting Samhain without the use of anything supernatural, but the thing was physically stronger than he was and he lost the knife.  Of course Dean walked in while he was killing the thing and had to get upset about it.

Part of Sam, the part of him that was bitter about spending eight hours in the car alternating between hostile silences and getting screamed at, wondered if Dean would have preferred that Samhain kill him than that he use his abilities.  The rest of him just didn’t want to know. 

And of course the whole thing was a test.  Cas admitted as much to Dean.  It was a test to see what Dean would do under “battle conditions.”  They were required to answer to the Righteous Man.  He admitted all of this to Dean while Uriel took his time threatening Sam with obliteration the moment he ceased to be useful.  Sam once again bit his tongue.  He wondered if he was strong enough yet to exorcise an angel and if he could, where it would end up. 

Things with Dean got progressively tenser.  Dean knew he was still in touch with Ruby; he didn’t know about the rest of his “army.”  Sam tried not to use his abilities around Dean but it wasn’t like he could hide the way that objects around him shook when he had a nightmare, or sometimes lights exploded.  He just tried to sleep less.  It wasn’t difficult.  Dean, too, slept less and less.  Eventually he admitted that he remembered Hell, but that he couldn’t talk about it with Sam because he wouldn’t understand.  Cas came by on occasion with this cryptic warning or that bit of information.  Sometimes Sam thought the angel was looking at him.  He made a point of turning away.  He didn’t need that.  He didn’t need Cas’ pity, and he didn’t need to feel worse when all he saw was contempt or indifference either.  He knew he looked terrible, lack of sleep and lack of food showing up on his face and body. 

At one point Dean said something to him about it.  “Cas thinks someone’s supposed to be taking care of you.” 

Sam’s laugh was bitter even to his own ears.  “Does he really?  What would he know about it?”

“I don’t know, man.  I really don’t.  But you look like crap.  Go eat.  Go sleep.” 

“Eat me, Dean.” 

Ruby brought them a case, a girl who had escaped from a locked ward possibly using superpowers.  Lilith’s bunch wanted her badly for whatever reason.  Sam wanted to take the case.  Dean didn’t, probably entirely because Ruby had brought it.  They took it anyway and it took all of three seconds of looking at her to know something was off.  Anna Milton didn’t know it yet though. 

“Sam Winchester?” she asked when they found her in the attic.  She looked at him like she could see the real him.  “And the Dean?”

Great. It turned out that she was able to hear angels communicating with one another.  They didn’t get much of a chance to discuss the possibilities involved with that because that was the moment when a very powerful Lilith partisan decided to show up.  Sam was able to partially pull him before the demon used his own power against him, throwing him down a set of stairs and turning his attention to Dean.  He raced back up the stairs when consciousness returned, Ruby having taken Anna and fled, and managed to get the creature off of Dean for a moment by stabbing him with the demon-killing knife.  It was enough of a distraction to grab Dean and make their exit through the stained glass window. 

Sam patched them up at the motel, then waited for word from Ruby.  Dean complained the whole time about Ruby’s influence, and Sam tried to make it clear the state that he’d been in when Dean was gone, but his brother wasn’t interested.  All he got was the “sex with a demon” part.  Sam sighed.  Why did he bother speaking at all? 

Ultimately they met up with Ruby and Anna at an old cabin in Kentucky, just over the state line.  The digs weren’t that great but it was what they had.  They were visited by Castiel and Uriel, who demanded that they hand Anna over for slaughter.  Well, that wasn’t happening.  Not at all, and Sam didn’t even let Dean be the one to tell them that.  Uriel wanted to smite him on the spot for that, but Castiel insisted that they be given twenty-four hours to change their mind. 

Sam then discussed with Anna what might be going on with her, what it was like to know things and feel things and experience things without understanding why.  He offered to take a closer look to see if he could get some idea of what was going on – it wasn’t his usual type of work, but he was willing to see what there was to see.  She assented, much to Dean’s anger.

It took Sam all of five minutes to sense what Anna’s problem was.  “There’s no easy way to say this, but you’re an angel.”  He could see the remnants of grace clinging to her like a shadow.

“That’s not a come-on, is it?” she laughed nervously.

“I think if you take a few minutes and look deep inside yourself you’ll find yourself remembering things.  Just, uh, have a seat.  In the corner and clear your mind.  I’ll sit with you.” 

She sat for an hour.  When she opened her eyes again, she seemed to be a completely different person.  “You were right.”  It turned out that she’d cut out her grace and fallen to earth, becoming human or human-ish.  She could still hear the angels.  When Sam had reached out with his mind, he’d heard how she did that.  It was a simple thing, really.  If that was something you wanted of course.  Her grace, fortunately had fallen somewhere nearby.  The quartet went to retrieve it, but were thwarted by the fact that someone had already taken it. 

“Uriel.”  Sam could feel the lingering remnants of his grace all over the site, a beautiful old oak tree. 

“Just because you don’t like the guy,” Dean objected. 

“I don’t,” Sam admitted.  “’But there are traces of him all over this place.  It’s like… it’s like a dog lifted his leg and marked the whole place!”

“That doesn’t help us now!” Ruby objected.  “Those angels are coming back tonight and we have no way to fight them.  Unless brainiac here thinks he can exorcise angels now.” 

“No,” Dean growled.  “They’re the good guys.  Just… not now.”

Sam rolled his eyes.  “They’re leading you around by the nose, Dean.” 

In the end Sam developed a plan, and it worked.  Anna was saved and recovered her grace, returning to her angelic state.  Alastair disappeared.  Sam, Ruby and Dean drove off into the sunset together. 

More seals broke.  In theory the angels were supposed to be defending them.  Instead they fell.  And really, it was kind of an impossible task.  There were thousands of seals.  Lilith only needed to break sixty-six of them.  The solution, the obvious solution, was to go after the one doing the breaking instead of wringing hands about which seal might or might not be next.  Dean, despite what the angels were saying about him being the righteous one to end it or whatever, wasn’t interested in that.  He made a lot of noises about not gunning for revenge, and doing the job that was in front of them, and everything in its time. 

Sam knew he wasn’t strong enough to take on Lilith, not alone.  He also didn’t know how he could get stronger.  He’d been pretty damned strong in Hell, but he wasn’t a fan of going back into Hell without an angel at his back and right now he didn’t want an angel at his front, back or side.  Okay, that wasn’t entirely accurate.  He wanted Cas, and that was stupid.  He’d only been around him for what, four months?  He’d only been with him once, for one night?  A night Cas seemed to have forgotten had ever happened. 

Cas was still the only person to have ever been in his life to actually know him, for who he was, and make him feel good.  Yes, it had all been a lie.  It had been a lie, faked to get his cooperation with the mission to get Dean out of Hell.  Even the sex had probably been a lie, intended to draw him in and gain his trust.  Apparently he was just that easy.  But he had felt good all the same.  Was it so wrong of him to want that back?  To want to feel like a person again? 

Apparently it was.  He stopped even trying to reason with Dean.  It wasn’t like his brother was listening.  He stopped coming inside much when he was at Bobby’s.  A time or two he even slept out in one of the old junkers.  Sometimes someone said something when he eventually came in.  Sometimes no one noticed.  They took on case after case, with Dean being a man on a mission for everything except what actually counted.  Sam’s pack of demons was starting to get restless.  They wanted action, action against their actual enemy not this sitting around and waiting.  “The time isn’t right, Sammy,” Dean kept telling him.  “The angels will let me know when it’s right.”

Then the siren thing happened and everything got blown to Hell.  Thank God – well, thank who or whatever looked after freaks like him – that Nick Monroe had no idea what he was, or Dean would be dead.  He’d laid down on that floor and he’d wished that his brother would just bring that axe down, because he knew Dean didn’t need the venom to say any of what he’d said.  He’d been sneaking through Sam’s phone, eavesdropping on Sam’s phone calls.  He just didn’t put it quite as bluntly.  And maybe it was all true.  Maybe the Sam he knew was gone.  Maybe he’d never existed in the first place, because there had never been a Sam who was willing to have his phone calls monitored or his phone log checked and damn it what was the point of even being here when Sam had no one, not a single soul who cared about him. 

Bobby came and saved the day and the brothers sat on the hood of the Impala and drank coke with their substitute father and assured him that they understood that it had been the venom speaking, that they were good with each other.  But knew better.  It lasted until they got to the next town, when they sat in the diner going over possibilities for the next case and Dean started throwing his own words back in his face.  “That is, if you’re sure I’m not holding you back or anything,” he said with a twist to his face. 

Something inside Sam snapped at that point.  He got up calmly from the table, went out to the car, grabbed his duffel and his laptop and focused his will.  He hadn’t teleported here on Earth yet, he wasn’t sure if he could, but he was not going to sit there and take that.  Not from Dean, who’d practically disowned him.  He reappeared in the town cemetery and called Ruby.  “Where are you?” he asked.

She wasn’t far away and agreed to come get him.  “No more of this crap, Ruby,” he told her.  “It’s going to be all Lilith, all the time.” 

She sighed.  “I’m really sorry it worked out this way.”  She put a hesitant hand on his back.  “I mean, you were so glad to have him back – you worked so hard to get him back.  You deserve better than this.” 

He sighed.  “I don’t.  Not really.   But what this means is that now I can focus.  Like I said.  We’ll get her.  No more distractions.  First things first though. “  He put his phone on the ground and shot it.  “I’m going to need a new phone.” 

The phone wasn’t the only thing he needed, although it was easily replaced.  He joined his comrades – his army, small as they were – in Baltimore, where they holed up in an abandoned townhouse for the time being to strategize.  For a while Sam expected that someone would come looking for him.   Dean, probably.  Couldn’t have the family freak wandering around without his keeper now.  Maybe Bobby.  Maybe, hope beyond hope, Castiel.  None of these things happened, and Sam began to wish that they would.  Of course it was impossible.  Now that Dean was back, Sam was no longer necessary to any of them.  Dean’s life was better, freer without him.  Bobby had always preferred Dean and Cas –

Well.  Cas. 

He threw himself into training with a new fervor that frightened even Zille.  Physical training in the morning, then meditation, then research, then hunting.  They hunted demons all over the country, just like before, only now Sam wasn’t trying to save anyone or even to get revenge.  He knew now what his purpose was.  He was a weapon, aimed at Lilith.  He needed to get stronger.  He hadn’t been able to pull Alastair, and he needed so much more than that. 

Pete suggested drinking demon blood.  It would kill him eventually, probably – it was highly addictive after all – but it would give him a boost and no mistake.  Sam thought about it.  He didn’t care if it killed him.  Truly he didn’t.  He wasn’t a big fan of the idea of addiction.  It was too easy for his enemies, of whom there were too many to count, to use that against him and cut off his supply in some way before he finished the job.  So… no.  Instead, he focused on Hell.

It was still painful to think of Castiel, but well, pain was the reward for stupidity, right?  And he’d been stupid to trust, stupid to listen, stupid to hope.  But Castiel had said something useful in the middle of his blather of him being “something more.”  He’d said something about Sam being “of Hell,” about it being part of him.  Maybe he could use his connection to the Inferno to fuel his abilities?  In his meditation, he focused on once again lowering his own mental barriers.  If the place was part of him he should be able to use it just as much as he could use any other part of himself for energy, right? 

It was about a month after his flight from Dean that they got a visitor.  He could sense “angel” from the street and for a moment he felt the stirrings of hope, but circumstances quashed it.  “Hi,” Anna greeted, her pink wings with the maroon tips resplendent behind her.  “Can I come in?”

“It’s okay,” Sam rasped to the others.  “She’s not a typical angel.” 

She smiled a little.  “No.  I’m not.”  She glanced around.  “You guys really need to put up some angel proofing.”

“Seriously?  That’s a thing?”

“Totally a thing,” she grinned.  “And I can teach you.  Because you have a problem.” 

Sam grabbed her a chair.  It wasn’t much of a chair, it had been garbage picked from the curb a few weeks ago, but it was sturdy and had very little damage for having been left out in the rain.  “Only one?”

“They’re holding back on the seals, Sam.  They’re letting Lilith break seals with impunity.  Castiel isn’t encouraging your brother to stop Lilith.  He’s holding him back.  He keeps telling him to wait until ‘the time is right.’”

Sam frowned.  “How is he even supposed to kill Lilith?  I mean, if Alastair wasn’t bothered by the knife she’s not going to be concerned by it either.”

“I have no idea, Sam.  But I’m starting to think that Heaven isn’t trying to stop the Apocalypse.  I’m starting to think they’re helping.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The hunt for Lilith is all that matters, and Sam's army grows.

They got Anna a cell phone, got her on the same call chain the rest of the team were on.  Pete wasn’t exactly thrilled about it; he reminded Sam of what happened the last time he’d decided to trust an angel.  Ruby backed him, though.  “Anna has a death sentence on her head in Heaven,” she pointed out.  “They’d actually rather take her out before any of us; I saw them and I heard them.  So let’s stow the anti-angel crap, okay?  He hasn’t had his pretty little head turned by this one.” 

Sam smirked, hiding his sighs.  His head had gotten turned before.  Fortunately the only thing that had come from it was a bruised ego.  Maybe more than bruised, but that wasn’t the point.  Anna was admitted to the team and she taught them as much as she could about warding their boltholes against angels, both against their entry and against their detection.  “I know this is hard for you,” she told him once when they were alone.  “You’re hoping that he’ll come back to you.”

He snorted.  “I think hope is kind of overstating it.”  They were painting incredibly intricate symbols into the door, painstakingly precise, in paint that disappeared as soon as it dried.  “He’s not going to.”

“No,” she agreed.  “Angels don’t question their orders.  Not most of us, anyway.  It takes a lot of effort, a lot of will.  It’s painful, and it’s risky.”  One corner of her generous mouth quirked up.  “If it’s any consolation, he’s tried to intercede for you with Heaven.  Tried to get them to stop trying to come between you and Dean.  He was against the time travel trip.” 

He sighed.  “He still went.” 

She paused and put a hand on his shoulder.  “I know.  I’m sorry, for what it’s worth.” 

He managed a slight smile.  “I know.  It’s okay, you know?  I knew better.  I knew I shouldn’t get my hopes up like that.  I knew… I knew I shouldn’t get attached.  It’s for the best, I guess.  So… yeah.” 

“Maybe after…” she tried. 

He shook his head.  “It’s… I mean, he’s made his choice.  It’s great that he’s tried to get his superiors to cut me some slack but let’s face it, I was never anything to him but a means to an end.  A tool.  I knew it going in.”  He felt his features twist and tried to put them back into something that couldn’t quite be described so much as a rictus.  “I might have wished it was different, but that was stupid.  A fantasy I let get the better of me, you know?  I need to just do the job.  Get it over with.” 

She planted a gentle kiss on his head.  “I’m sorry, Sam.  I wish there could be more for you.” 

He made himself laugh.  “What, and miss out on all this?”  He gestured at the decrepit old building. 

Anna helped to coach him, on fighting angels.  He hadn’t asked Castiel much about that before.  He hadn’t believed he’d need that.  After all, they were the good guys.  They were bringing Dean back.  Now they would at the very best, if Anna were entirely paranoid, be a hindrance that bore him an extra special grudge.  He felt like a kid again, gawky and growing into his limbs while fighting his larger and more experienced brother and father.  This time was different, though.  He had actual fighting experience.  He had abilities of his own.  And he had something spurring him on.  He tried to make up for his lack of wings with his telekinesis, with his teleportation, with his ability to grab onto grace (although he tried to limit that – he liked Anna and there was no way to do that in a friendly way.)  At first it didn’t get him far.  Then he started to be able to get the better of her about a quarter of the time, then half. 

They hunted, of course.  They tracked down seals as they built up their strength.  It wasn’t always easy to tell what was a seal and what was just regular supernatural activity.  When a series of bodies showed up spaced at regular intervals along I-64 in Virginia, spread out in what looked like ritualistic poses, Sam grabbed Ruby and Zille and went to investigate.  The police believed it to be the work of a serial killer, as usual, and technically they were right.  He took photos of some carvings left in the victims’ backs and sent them on to base, where Anna was able to confirm that they were in fact part of another ritual to break a seal. 

This wasn’t exactly news.  What they did need to do was to figure out who was trying to break the seal and take them out before they could finish.  They had three different candidates that Sam could think of off the top of his head – witches in the service of Lilith, demons in her service, or angels working to bring about the end of days.  And of course they had to dodge hunters while they were at it. 

Zille was dispatched to the crime scenes to check for evidence that might indicate what was involved.  Ruby got to go keep an eye out for hunters.  Sam’s job, on the other hand, was to predict what would happen next.  He took the files and tried to piece together a pattern.  It was pretty clear from the crime scene photos that the victims had been slain where they were found, which at least made the job easier.  They were all women – well, that was fairly typical.  For whatever reason serial killers generally seemed to prefer women, both because of their own misogyny and because they could get away with it easier.  These women all had certain commonalities, though.  They were all white.  They all had dark hair.  They all had been between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five at the time of their death, and none had ever been pregnant.  All of them seemed to have been left-handed. 

He did some more poking around.  None of them had been born in the area.  Of the five victims so far, two were immigrants (one from France and one from Russia.)  One had come from South Dakota, one from Boston and one from Florida.  He chewed on the end of a pen as he looked at detectives’ notes.  In the days before the women had been killed their lives had been fairly routine.  They had different jobs; their paths had never intersected.  The only commonality was that they all shopped at different outposts of the same supermarket chain. 

That strongly pointed to a demon, although a witch wasn’t out of the question.  When Zille got back with her crime scene report she leaned more strongly toward witch; there was no sulfur at any of the crime scenes, and demons tended to leave sulfur behind them when they did anything interesting.  Sam revised his working theory to suggest witch working with demon, which suggested the possibility of a very interesting fight ahead. 

Ruby called in with less stellar news.  Bobby Singer was in town and had spotted her. He wanted to see Sam – alone.  Sam’d long since given up the idea that someone was looking for him, and had decided he worked better without them, but part of him was still secretly glad to hear at least someone still wanted to see him, even if Bobby wouldn’t be the first person he’d think of.  “It would be good to have Bobby’s input,” he mused. 

“No way,” both of his partners objected.  “Sam, he’s not your friend,” Ruby continued.  “He’s Dean’s friend, and he’ll just try to force you back to Dean.  Or worse.” 

“You know I’m not going,” he frowned.  “This is a seal.  It’s important.  What happens to me isn’t.  I’ll talk to him, meet up someplace public.  It’ll just be an hour or so.  Or whatever.  If it gets too hot I’ll teleport out of there, no worries.” 

He called the number and agreed to meet Bobby in the bar at the local Chili’s.  The older hunter was already there when Sam arrived, drinking a margarita colored with something not found in nature.  Sam managed half a smile and took the seat that he pointed to.  “Been a while, Sam,” he grunted. 

An overly cheery waiter showed up and Sam ordered water.  “Yeah.  Well.  I wasn’t exactly welcome around Dean anymore, so.” 

“That ain’t how he puts it.  And he oughtta be here in about eight hours so you should be able to talk out your issues like grown-ass men instead of stalking off and leaving each other in diners like a couple of idjits.” 

Sam felt the color drain from his face.  “You already called him.”

“Of course I called him.  I called him as soon as I spoke to you.  He’s been worried sick about you, him and both of those angels.  You caused a heap of trouble when you up and disappeared on us like that without a word to anyone, boy.”  He fixed Sam with the glare that had always been able to make him feel about as big as a crumb. 

“I’m sure they’re all very concerned for my welfare,” Sam spat out bitterly.  “How many seals have they managed to save?”

“It’s about more than saving seals, Sam!  They want to know what you’re doing!  The way you disappeared, they think you might have…”

He snorted.  “What, gone darkside?”

“You are hanging around with Ruby again.  The good guys don’t go hanging around with demons, Sam.  I don’t know who you think you’re fooling.”  He shook his head.  “They want to help you before you’ve gone too far from human.”

Sam couldn’t help but notice his use of the third person and it caused a bit of a pang.  “You know better, though.  Dad shared things with you, when I was a kid.  He talked to you.”  He made himself smile gently even though his hands shook under the table.  “I read his journal, remember?  You don’t think there’s much chance for me.  You think I’m too far gone already but you don’t want to say anything to Dean.”

The older man looked away.  “Sam, this ain’t about me.”

“I left Dean because the situation had become too much.  It’s the end of the world.  If the angels have some great plan for him that’s fine, but I for one don’t trust them as far as I can throw them and I’ve got plenty of reason not to.  I’m going to focus on stopping Lilith from breaking seals, because someone has to.  Maybe I am a monster.  Maybe I am subhuman.  Maybe I am the greatest freak to ever walk the earth but at least I’m doing something.  And I’m not going to sit back and let Dean stop me.”  He stood up.  “I’m sorry, Bobby.  I was hoping that we could work together on this seal, because it’s a big deal and I really respect your research and your intelligence.  But I don’t think that’s going to work out, and I’m sorry.” 

“Sam, don’t.” 

“The only thing that matters is killing Lilith and stopping the Apocalypse,” he insisted, leaning in so that no one else could hear him.  “Once that’s done, I don’t care if you and the other hunters decide I’m fair game.  I won’t even fight you.  But until then, stay out of my way.  If you’re not going to be part of the solution at least don’t help her out.”

He stalked out of the bar.  When he was sure no one else would see him, he teleported back to the motel.  “You were right,” he groaned.  “Bad idea.”  He detailed the conversation to his colleagues. 

“We can take Dean Winchester any day,” Zille objected.  “I say let him come.  I’ll pick my teeth with his phalanges.” 

Ruby cleared her throat and indicated Sam with her eyebrows.  “I think maybe no?”

“Right.  Sorry.”

“Anyway,” she continued.  “We should take off.  You’re in danger if there are going to be hunters here, Sam.  We all are, but you most of all since their bullets can still hurt you.  Probably.”

“There’s still a seal here, and it’s still breaking.  We know that the angels probably won’t let Dean and company be much use in saving it, so we need to do the right thing here.”  He exhaled slowly.

Zille made a face and looked at Ruby.  “Ugh.  He’s making me feel so clean.” 

“I know, right?”

He managed to huff out a laugh.  “Anyway, let’s try to ice this witch or demon or whatever and get out of here before the others get here and create a problem for us.”      

Unfortunately for them, the pattern of attacks indicated that the next murder wouldn’t take place until the following night, which meant that when Dean rolled into town at the prescribed time it didn’t take long for him to hear the telltale rumble of the Impala.  He considered flight, but he decided to stay.  Ruby and Zille were with him.  He stood calmly while Dean fumbled through picking the lock on the motel room door, the demons by his side.  “Normal people knock,” he said when the door swung open. 

Dean took in his stance, the women by his side.  “You knew I was coming.” 

“Car’s not exactly quiet, Dean.  And Bobby told me he’d called you.”  He studied his brother’s face.  Extra lines, drawn brows, pressed lips.  “How’ve you been?”

His face flashed bright red.  “How’ve I been?  Like you give a crap!  You just took off again, like always!  I thought we had each other’s backs!”

Sam forced himself to remain calm.  “Yeah, well, so did I.  But you didn’t want to have my back, you wanted a subordinate.  That’s what the siren gave you – a perfect little acolyte, willing to yield to your every whim without a question.  That’s never been me.  You said all that crap about how ‘Oh, the Sam I knew, he’s gone?’  No, Dean.  I’m me, I’m still me.  The Sam you think you had never existed.  You saw what you wanted to see and you just ignored the rest.” 

“I thought you said you got that was all the siren, huh?” Dean spat back.  “I didn’t mean any of that!”

“Yeah, well, you kept throwing what I said in my face so I guess it’s okay for you but not me.  Dean.  Look.  I’m not sure why you came here.”  He forced himself to stay calm. 

“I came here to get you back on the reservation.  I mean look at you.  Look at this.”  He gestured.  “You’re slutting around with not one but two demons, using your powers even though the angels told you not to –“

Sam’s hands balled into fists.  “Oh, the angels.  I forgot.  I’m here saving a seal, Dean.  Where are your angel friends now, huh?  How many seals have they managed to save while you’ve been running around poking at ghosts and vampires and haunted wishing wells?”

“That’s not the point, Sam!”

“It’s exactly the point, Dean.  I’m not answering to angels anymore, and if they want to smite me for it let them.  But they got you out of Hell for their reasons, not because they think highly of you.  They will use you up and throw you out like garbage, Dean, and the fallout when all of this is over is going to be catastrophic.  They are playing you like a fiddle.  And as for their attitude about my powers –“  He choked back a laugh that probably had more than a little bit of a sob to it.  “Go ask your good buddy Castiel how he felt about my powers while you were in Hell.”  He turned his back on Dean now.  Zille and Ruby closed behind him, blocking Dean from accessing him.  “I have a seal to save.  I don’t have time for drama, Dean.  If you want to write me off, write me off, but I’m not going anywhere with you.” 

His brother stormed away, possibly helped by a sudden gust of wind that “encouraged” him back out the door and slammed the door shut behind him.  That had come from Ruby, he knew.  “Thanks,” he whispered to his friends. 

They did go out that night and interrupted the murder.  Sam was right, there was a witch working with a demon and the fight was intense.  The witch managed to turn the very trees against them, twisting a massive oak around Ruby like it was some kind of Slinky.  Sam tried to use his ability to grab onto a soul but she was human; it was tricky work and it allowed the demon’s fists to find Sam’s ribcage with strength that definitely marked it out as possibly being the spawn of Lilith and a cement mixer.  He let the hits keep coming – he couldn’t afford to lose his concentration and almost cheered when he finally grabbed hold of his enemy’s mind and began to pull.

It was probably a pretty unpleasant way to die, now that he thought about it.  She screamed, and her screams echoed in his head but he couldn’t let up.  She was trying to free Lucifer, he reminded himself. 

Finally the witch died.  Zille had gotten Ruby’s knife from somewhere and stabbed the demon with it.  The poor intended victim, at least, had been spared watching this.  She’d been left inside a van, drugged until she was needed for the ritual.  Ruby teleported herself out of the tree and called 911 for the girl once they were a safe distance from the site, and then got Sam to a hospital.

Even he couldn’t deny that he needed one.  He found himself coughing blood in the backseat of Ruby’s car, and he was pretty sure that there was worse to come.  He didn’t react as they bundled him onto a gurney, even though it hurt.  He’d had worse and he’d have worse again.  They got him in for x-rays and CT scans right away, and then there was emergency surgery, which he almost welcomed because why wouldn’t you welcome emergency surgery when it came with a side dose of anesthesia? 

He came back to himself in a room, with Ruby.  “Hope you enjoyed the honeymoon, sweetie,” she smirked.  “The only way they’d let me stay was if I was your wife.  So – wife.” 

He groaned and adjusted the bed so he was in a more up-sitting position.  “How bad is it?” 

“Flail chest, hemothorax. She had some fun with your kidneys too.  You’re going to be taking a backseat for a while or until we can get you home to Anna, whichever.  I called her but I told her that Dean was in town, which meant that Cas was in town.  So, it will be a while.”  She tossed her magazine to the side.  “Might be for the best, you know?  Rest you up a bit, let you eat something.  I mean you don’t even have to put food in your mouth, they can just, like, give it to you intravenously.”  She winced when he glared.  “Or not.”

“There isn’t time, Ruby.  We need to fight Lilith, not sit here and watch…”  He trailed off, looking at the television.  “Is that… a Disney movie?”

“Dean said it was your favorite when you were a kid.”

“You spoke to Dean.” 

She looked away.  “Yeah.  He was, uh, waiting.  At the motel, when I went back to get some of your things while you were in surgery.  We fought for a while.  Zille wanted to kill him but we didn’t.  Told him you were hurt saving a seal, though.  He wasn’t happy about that.  He cried when I told him that you were in the hospital, Sam.” 

He turned his head away.  “Yeah.  I’m sure.” 

“He did.  I mean, first he blamed me for everything and tried to stab me, but still.  I don’t… I mean, he’s your brother.  He loves you.  Anyway, he also told me you’re like the worst patient ever and that you liked Beauty and the Beast.  Something about being a French girl in a yellow dress.”  She shrugged.  “I guess yellow would be a good color on you.”

“It was the only movie he could steal when I was a little kid and got hurt on a hunt.”  He sighed and gestured, and a cup of ice chips floated over to him. 

A familiar figure appeared in the doorway.  Ruby sprang to her feet when she heard him whisper “Castiel.”  His hair was, if possible, even more disheveled than usual. 

“Sam,” the angel breathed, and if Sam didn’t know better he could have almost believed again.  “You’re alive.”  He turned to Ruby.  “May we have a moment?”

“No,” she replied simply, crossing her arms across her chest. 

“I wish to speak to Sam alone,” he tried, inserting more authority into his voice. 

“And I said no.  We don’t trust you.  I don’t trust you alone with him, not the way that you threw him under the bus with Dean.  With the other angels.  And I sure as Hell don’t trust you with him now.  I know you’re here with Dean and that Dean has some idea about bringing him ‘back into the fold’ or some such crap.  No way.  He’s not being left alone with any of you.” 

“I just want to talk.”  He turned those massive blue eyes to Sam.  “Please, Sam.” 

“I’m pretty sure you’ve said everything there is to say, Cas.  I mean, what else is there?”  He looked away.  “You built me up, you used me, and you threw me away.  I should’ve known better.  I mean, I was warned but well, I didn’t so that’s on me.  But that doesn’t excuse what you did.”

“I never intended to hurt you, Sam,” the angel told him, drawing closer and pulling up a chair.  “Everything I did, everything I said, I meant.”

“You’re full of crap, Cas.  You dropped me like a hot rock as soon as we got out.  I mean, you came to tell me not to let on that we even knew each other – that we’d even met – before you revealed yourself to Dean.  I was your dirty little secret.  I had to let Dean think that I had no part in getting him out, allow you and Uriel to wrap him around your wings so you could drive a wedge in between us –“

“The Lord works in mysterious ways, Sam.” 

“No, Cas.  That was a choice, and you made it.”

“You agreed to it,” the angel retorted.  “And you broke that agreement when you hinted to Dean about my not always having been averse to your powers.”

“Seriously?  That’s how you’re going to play this?”  Sam shook his head, despite the dizziness.  “Just go, Cas.  I may not be able to stop loving you, but I’m not going to let you shame me into feeling bad about being honest.  Not when you’re the one who made me feel that I could help Dean with my powers in the first place.”  He was lying - he felt terrible about giving Dean the slightest hint about what had really happened.  But he also wasn’t about to let Castiel think that he was unaffected.

He stood, although the reluctance was plain on his face.  “I didn’t come here looking to fight, Sam.” 

“Then why did you come?”

“I came to see with my own eyes that the man I l- that you were alive, that you would recover.”  He turned for a moment.  “My orders are to follow the directions of the Righteous Man, Sam.  Can you try to understand that?  I wish that things could be different.  Maybe after – after his task is done – I will be free to pursue my own interests.”

“I hope that works out for you, Cas.  I do.  But I think we both know the odds of me being around to see it.”  He closed his eyes and lowered the bed.  “I’m tired, Cas.” 

“Sam –“

“That means you need to leave, Angel.”  Even though his eyes were closed Sam could hear the wicked grin in Ruby’s voice. 

There was a moment of silence.  Then a soft hand passed over Sam’s face and a sound of fluttering wings heralded his departure. 

Ruby had either enough class or enough wisdom not to mention the tear that leaked from his eye. 

As soon as Sam could be safely discharged from the hospital he let Ruby drive him back to Baltimore.  They didn’t want to let him go – the police really wanted details on who had given him such a beating, and did it have anything to do with the people who had showed up at the hospital claiming to be his brother and uncle and that the woman in there with him was not his wife but a demon?  There were murmurings about malnutrition and about the scars on his body and did he have anything he wanted to talk to a social worker or a mental health professional about, but they couldn’t force anything and he didn’t have time for that.  He had to stop Lilith.  Besides, somehow he doubted that they would find “an angel broke my heart and my brother thinks I’m evil” to be terribly believable. 

So back to Baltimore it was, where Anna finished healing him up.  Maybe more of a break would have been nice, but he could sleep when he was dead.  They tracked down more Lilith partisans in Missouri – what was it with demons and Missouri? – and stopped another seal from breaking  in Philadelphia.  When people randomly stopped dying in one town in Wyoming he groaned.  Another Seal.  Great.  And in Wyoming, across the country.  But who else was he going to send on this one?  It wasn’t like he could just reach out to Bobby and say, “Hey, could you give someone else a ring, it’s kind of a hike and I don’t want to leave this sweet setup I’ve got in Baltimore.” 

So the team set out for Wyoming again.  He took more of them than he had the last time.  If something was interfering with the natural order it probably involved some heavy power.  He wasn’t positive that he was ready for it, but he had to try.  So they headed out west and asked around, and Sam found that the last person to die in the town had been a twelve-year-old boy by the name of Cole. 

Cole, as it turned out, was still around – as a ghost.  Sam shook his head.  If he hadn’t accepted his abilities, hadn’t accepted who he was, he’d have been forced to find some other way of reaching out to this kid.  Spirit board, maybe.  Astral projection, although that sounded stupidly risky.  As it was, he was able to reliably just gesture to the kid when no living people were around and let him know that he was noticed. 

Being noticed didn’t mean that the kid was friendly.  “You’re with them,” he spat.  “The black smoke.  I saw you.”  He scowled briefly, and a lawn chair went flying at Sam’s head. 

Sam glared at the projectile and it sat back down on the ground.  “There are different types of black smoke, Cole,” he explained.  “They probably all look alike to you.” 

“They are all alike,” he insisted.  “When I died, and the man came to get me, the black smoke came and got him.”  He glanced at Sam.  “Why am I telling you this?” 

“Because I’m trying to help you, Cole.” 

“Can you help me come back to life?”

“No.  Trust me.  Nothing good comes of it.”

He snorted.  “What would you know about it?  All my mother does is sit there and cry.  All day.  All night.” 

“Cole?  I’ve, uh.  I’ve come back.  Trust me.  Nothing good comes of it.  It’s hard to see her like that, I know.  But do you think that maybe part of the reason she’s like that is that she can’t let go?  Because you haven’t let go?  You’re letting her know that you’re still there, and you’re trying to comfort her, but she can’t … she can’t move on with her life.  And you can’t move on to what’s next for you.”  He felt a chill on his skin and extended his senses, even as the boy tried to shrink in front of him.  The presence was colder than an angel yet oddly comforting, like a pair of arms waiting to offer an embrace.  He turned to face it, blocking access to Cole. 

The true form was vast, and dark.  It had been contained inside the image of a woman, a beautiful woman with pale skin and straight dark hair.  “Sam Winchester,” she greeted with a professional smile.  “It’s an honor and a pleasure.” 

He held out his hand.  Maybe he was a little wary, but he still wasn’t about to be disrespectful of whoever this was until he knew her.  He had his suspicions of course.  “I’m afraid I haven’t had the pleasure.”

“My name is Tessa.  I’m a reaper.  Your brother and I met a few years ago after a demon crashed a tractor-trailer into your car.  He won’t remember me, of course.”  She smiled and took his hand.  “It’s rare for anyone to be able to see me, but you’re not exactly human anymore, are you?”  It wasn’t a judgment, it wasn’t a condemnation.  It was a simple statement of fact. 

He inhaled sharply, made himself exhale more slowly.  “No.  I suppose not.  Were you the reaper who brought me to Hell the last time I died?”

“No.  And I’m reasonably certain you didn’t go to Hell, Sam.  But I’m actually here on business, so if you’ll excuse me –“

“Listen, Tessa,” he interrupted, staying between her and the boy.  “I get that the natural order of this place is being dangerously thrown off.  That’s why I’m here, really.  But I think you’re in danger.  I think something is harming, maybe killing, reapers.  Cole said that something, it sounds like demons, stole his reaper and made off with it.  You need to get out of town, as quickly as you can.  Come back when we’ve taken care of it, okay?”

Her smile shifted, became a little condescending.  “Sam, I’m not worried about your little angel-demon war.  I’m not part of that.  I serve Death, and Him alone.  I’m outside of the whole Apocalypse thing.  I’m here to do a job and I’m going to do it.  You have no idea what’s going to happen if the balance isn’t restored.” 

“I’m not saying not to restore it, Tessa,” he urged.  “I’m just saying to get to safety until everything is fixed.  I’m not even asking you to get involved.  I just want you to be safe.” 

That, of course, was when the sky darkened.   A massive cloud of black smoke approached.  Cole screamed, but the enemy wasn’t aimed at him.  It was aimed at Tessa.  On instinct Sam grabbed her and thrust the reaper behind him, placing himself directly between the demon and its presumed target.  He reached out with his mind and identified the source: Alastair. 

His heart raced and his palms sweated.  This was the demon that had hurt Dean, carved him into someone else.  He reached down inside himself for more power, everything he had, and pushed back.  Hard. 

The smoke coalesced, and a familiar face appeared.  Sam felt his own curl into a snarl of hate.  Alastair’s energy pushed at him.  “You think you can stop this, boy?” the demon leered.  “You think your ridiculous half-breed body can stop the power of Hell itself?” 

Sam reached further.  His muscles ached, trembled, burned, but he ignored them.  “Shut up,” he ground out, and he pushed again.  This time the power came from elsewhere, like a dam within him bursting, and Alastair found himself blown back into some trees several yards away.  “Get out of here,” he ordered Tessa.  “Go somewhere safe until this is solved.” 

He felt her leave without a word.  “Impressive,” Alastair had to admit, staggering to his feet.  He was bleeding from his nose and his ears.  Could a demon get a brain injury?  “You’ve been working out, I see.  Too bad you weren’t willing to take that step before I got my claws into your darling brother.” 

Sam didn’t bother responding.  Instead he grabbed onto Alastair’s spirit and pulled, forcing it back into the Pit.  The demon fought; he’d never had an exorcism that struggled quite so much.  The fiend managed to pull away, sending a wave of sulfur and flame at him that should have reduced him to ash.  He let the assault wash over him.  It probably should have killed him, but no one in this town was able to die these days.  It at least should have hurt, but instead his body absorbed it like sunshine. 

Alastair’s eyes widened and he fled, returning to his smoky form and heading north.  “Cole,” Sam said, turning to face the boy.  “Do you know where he went?”

The ghost flinched.  “Your eyes!”

He sighed.  “Yeah.  It’s a… thing they do.  Sometimes, when I use my abilities.”   They must have gone gold again.  One day they’d change permanently, if he lived that long.  Oh well.  There was nothing to be done about it. 

“The smoke first showed up at my funeral.  At the funeral parlor.”  He pointed to the north.  “I think they’re there.” 

Sam shook his hand.  “Thanks for all your help, Cole.  Listen.  I’m going to try to keep you and your family safe.”

“Are you an angel?”

He laughed.  “Far from it, Cole.  Far from it.  But I’m going to try to help you.  You’ll probably see the lady who was here before again, though.  When you do, remember what we talked about.  Okay?” 

Cole nodded, and Sam started off toward the funeral home.  He sent a text to Ruby on his way. 

They hadn’t been expecting a lot of resistance, only having five demons in total in the building including Alastair.  Apparently they were counting on Hell’s grand inquisitor being enough to solve any serious problems for them.  They’d covered the building in angel wards for some reason.  Maybe not all angels were in on the plan to raise Lucifer?  Not Sam’s problem.  He sent his companions to surround the building.  If they wanted to hide him and his from some more of his foes, fine.  He exorcised the door guard without anything resembling a problem.  The body collapsed to the ground, dead before he’d been possessed but unable to die thanks to the lack of reapers. 

Sam and Ruby sneaked inside.  She stabbed the first of Alastair’s henchmen to approach.  He felt bad about letting her do the fighting right now – he’d taken some hits in his earlier fight with Alastair and he’d feel them later but right now whatever had opened in his brain had really brought something forward and he was feeling no pain at all.  Still, it was up to him to find the reaper and free him.  He reached out with his mind, a yellow-tinged tendril searching for the sub-zero chill of Death’s servant.

He peeled off to the right, following a long, dark corridor.  The reaper was trapped in one of the smaller funerary chapels, stuck in the middle of an intricate symbol on the floor that looked like a few squares drawn at angles to one another.  This one was in the body of an old man, more like what Dean had seen in the faith healer’s tent, and he looked like he was asleep.  Sam scratched his head.  Well, the simplest solution was usually the best one, right?  He took a knife from his boot and scraped away one of the lines.

He never even saw the reaper move.  One moment he was sleeping peacefully – like the dead, his mind helpfully supplied – and the next he was standing behind Sam.  “Thank you,” he intoned, laying a frozen hand on Sam’s left shoulder before simply ceasing to occupy that space.

He blinked, still feeling the chill on his flesh.  Then he broadcast a message to his team.  “Seal saved.  Fall back when safe.”  He ran back to Ruby and collected her.  Together they made their way back to the cars, where they were to rendezvous with the rest of the team.

Sam decided to head back to Cole’s place to check on the ghostly boy.  He didn’t want Alastair to take his frustrations out on the child or his family, after all.  He decided to teleport, both in the interests of time and because he could.  The feeling of raw power had not left his veins.  He had to focus, had to remember why he was here.  Once he showed up at the home he had no trouble regaining that clarity.  Alastair had indeed decided to pay the boy a visit. Sam got between the demon and the ghost again.  “So good to see you again Sam,” the demon leered.  “Let’s see if you’re really worthy –“

A bright blue lightning bolt struck Alastair, just like something out of Greek mythology, and he was gone.  Sam jumped back, only to find Castiel standing the same distance behind him as Alastair had been in front of him.  His heart caught in his throat.  “What are you doing here?” he rasped around the lump.

“Tessa found me,” he admitted.  “She was concerned for your safety; angels and reapers rarely interact.”  He turned to Cole.  “You should go home, Cole.” 

The kid wasn’t about to resist that tone of gentle authority.  He disappeared.  “We saved the seal,” he reported.  “No casualties.” 

“I am glad.  I must confess that I miss our time together.” 

“Wasn’t me who decided it had to end.” 

Cas sighed.  “I miss you, Sam.  But orders –“

“I know.  We’ve been over this.”  He looked away.  “What did you do to Alastair?”

“We took him prisoner.  He’ll be a valuable asset to our intelligence.”  He stepped forward, close enough to touch.  “Your brother misses you.” 

“My brother wants to hunt me.  He wanted to hunt me before.  I’m sure he’d love this.”  He gestured at his eyes.  He had to do something with his hands.  He couldn’t put them on Cas however much he wanted to. 

“He wants to keep you safe, Sam.  I don’t think he’s certain what he wants to keep you safe from, but he wants to keep you safe.” 

“He should worry about himself.  What exactly is it that your side wants him for, Cas?” 

The angel reached out and touched his face.  His hand was still as soft and gentle as Sam remembered.  “I didn’t come here to fight, Sam.”  He stroked his cheek as he brushed some of his hair away.  “Why can’t you just come home, be part of the team again?”

“I was never part of the team, Cas.”  He couldn’t stop himself from leaning into the touch, even though he didn’t want to.  “Even when we were working together.  You were still using me.  You encouraged me to love you so that I would play along, but you still threw me away once you were done.” 

“I didn’t want to.  I still don’t.  You know that I care for you, Sam.”

“Then why am I alone?  Why do I need to dodge hunters and my own family while I try to stop Lilith?”  He gave a bitter little laugh.  “We shouldn’t be on different sides here, Castiel.”

“We’re not.” 

“Bullshit.” 

Cas kissed him then, and for a moment Sam let the sensation carry him away.  Nothing else mattered, nothing else even existed and Sam needed this, needed to feel something good and pure and right and loving in his life. 

And that was what brought him up short.  This wasn’t right, it wasn’t pure and it wasn’t loving.  He loved Cas, he couldn’t help that.  But there was very little about love in how Cas felt about him.  If there were, he wouldn’t have thrown him under the bus with Dean.  He wouldn’t have wanted them to be strangers when Cas met Dean.  He wouldn’t have been so ashamed of having been associated with a demon-blooded freak, whatever his words about Sam’s blood not being something to be ashamed of. 

He couldn’t have this, even though every cell in his body cried out for it.  “I’m sorry, Cas,” he said, shaking his head and pushing him away gently.  “You don’t get to do that unless you mean it.  I’m not going to be your dirty little secret.”

The angel gave him a sad little smile.  “Angels don’t get dirty, Sam.”

“Kind of my point, Cas.”  He teleported back to the car before he could hear anymore. 

He didn’t speak the entire ride back to Baltimore.  No one asked him to.  They had about a week’s peace when they got back to base.  Well, peace was relative for demons.  They researched.  They hunted.  They fought.  Sam tried to understand the power that now burned inside him, but even Anna couldn’t explain it to him.  Not that she was around much anyway.  She heard something on what they euphemistically called Angel Radio that made her nervous and insisted on checking it out.  Sam was capable of listening in on Angel Radio, but they’d decided early on that it wasn’t a great idea.  It was too hard to filter out all the different voices, and of course many of them were filled with hate for him specifically, which didn’t do great things for his mindset.  Ruby had actually put her foot down rather firmly on the subject, and Anna concurred.  They were after all on a pretty strict timetable and the end of the world wasn’t going to wait for Sam to unravel himself from a knot of self-loathing in the corner. 

It was at the end of that week that he got a call from Anna asking him and Ruby to meet with her at her favorite coffee shop in Baltimore.  They went, of course.  Sam knew that Anna and Ruby were meeting a lot more frequently than Sam was meeting with Anna; that was great.  He felt bad about taking away her ability to choose not to betray them, but she and Anna had chosen each other completely and openly and they seemed to be pretty good for each other despite the difficulty in terms of species.  Or maybe because of it, he didn’t know.  If she was asking to meet them both the matter clearly needed immediate attention. 

He sat down across from her with lattes for both women and glanced around, wondering yet again if anyone had the first idea of what was in their midst.  An angel, a demon, a whatever-he-was – enough cosmic firepower to take down an entire city block right there, drinking coffee and foamed milk.  “So what’s going on, Anna?” he demanded. 

“The angels have Alastair,” she announced, leaning forward.  “They’re holding him in a warded warehouse in Utah and they want to interrogate him about broken seals and murdered angels.” 

Ruby frowned.  “I mean, we know about the detention and about the seals.  Hadn’t heard about the murdered angels, but I can’t find it in my heart to be too worried about it.  With one exception, I’m not a fan.”  She grinned and grabbed her lover’s hand.

“Well, the thing is, Alastair’s not talking.”  Anna gave Ruby a squeeze, but her eyes stayed on Sam.  “They showed up in Dean’s hotel room last night and abducted him, demanding his ‘help’ in getting Alastair’s cooperation.” 

Sam’s mouth went dry.  “They want him to start torturing Alastair.” 

The redhead nodded.  “He was Alastair’s apprentice in Hell.” 

“But he wasn’t his apprentice for all that long,” he objected, leaning forward himself and grabbing his spoon.  “And… honestly, I don’t think he can do it.  I mean, I haven’t been around him in a while, but I don’t think he’s able to do it.  I don’t think he’s strong enough.”

“I don’t know.”  Ruby’s pretty lips curled in distaste.  “I think he’s enough of a dick to stoop to torture.” 

“That’s not what I mean.”  He glared at the disparagement of his brother but didn’t argue.  He didn’t have time.  “Alastair’s been in his position for millennia.  Dean studied under him for how long?  And Alastair’s the one who broke him in the first place, who convinced him to break.  I don’t think – “

“Exactly.”  Anna leaned back, lips twitching with triumph. 

“Oh God.  Whose idea was this?”

“Uriel seemed to be leading the cause, but Castiel pressured Dean into giving in.”  She sighed.  “I’m sorry, Sam.  I know how you feel about him.” 

“How I feel about him has nothing to do with how I see him.  It’s not like I don’t realize we’ve both got flaws.”  He barked out a bitter chuckle.  “I need to go deal with this, Anna.” 

“I’m still not seeing a problem.  Alastair’s contained, the angels are distracted and not screwing up any more seals, and Dean’s caught up in something else instead of breathing down our necks.”  Ruby put her hands on the table and looked at both of the others with nonchalance.  “It doesn’t have to be a thing.” 

“Ruby, he’s my brother.  No matter what else, he’s my brother.  I can’t let him do that.”  He turned to Anna.  “Can you take me there?” 

She nodded.  They went out into an alley for the teleportation – no need to draw attention to themselves after all  - and in the blink of an eye he found himself outside an abandoned warehouse.  He could feel the energy inside: Alastair, uncontained, was the most pressing concern.  “Shit,” he said, running inside. 

Anna heard something and went to investigate, leaving Sam to deal with the mess of a situation before him.  Dean was unconscious – Sam could only tell by his spirit’s presence in his body that he still lived – and bloody on the floor, beaten to a pulp.  Castiel was being held against the wall by an unfettered Alastair, who was trying to draw the angel out of his vessel.  Cas was fighting, but losing. 

Sam lashed out with power, not bothering with finesse or gestures.  He just shoved the demon away from his former lover, pinning him against the wall.  “Sam!” Cas croaked. 

“Oh, look,” Alastair gagged.  He could do no more than speak and even that was only with difficulty.  “If it isn’t the little prince himself.” 

“Who is murdering the angels?” Sam demanded.  And then he grabbed onto Alastair’s essence and he twisted. 

The demon screamed.  “It isn’t us!” he wailed.  “We appreciate the help but it is not us.  We would kill a thousand.  Not seven.” He drew a deep breath when Sam relented slightly. His mouth twisted into a pained grin. “Will you send be back to Hell, Your Highness?” he mocked. 

Sam forced his body to relax, without letting go.  “No.”  He hadn’t done this, not on the surface, but he remembered how it had been done.  He reached out with the power inside him and slew Alastair.  The demon expired in a puff of light, like a light bulb suddenly going out.  The host body, long since dead, dropped to the ground. 

Cas gaped at him.  “You have your answers,” Sam growled at him, scooping Dean up into his arms.  “Clean him out of this crime scene.  Leave no trace.” 

He teleported himself and his brother outside.  Anna was nowhere to be found, but someone had thoughtfully brought the Impala here.  He grabbed Dean’s keys and drove him to the nearest hospital. 

He stayed with his brother until Castiel found them, three days later.  The police were interested in how he’d managed to get into such a state, but had no way of disproving Sam’s story.  The angel came into the room to find Sam holding his brother’s hand.  “How is he?” he inquired lamely.

“You can’t tell?” Sam snorted.

“Alastair’s attack harmed my grace.  It will be some time yet before it is healed.”  He looked away.

“So you can’t even heal him.”  He shook his head. 

“Not at the present.” 

“You had no business putting him in that situation,” Sam seethed. 

“We had no choice.  We had no other interrogators –“

“That’s not what I’ve heard.” 

“Anna was not a reliable narrator.  And it should have been perfectly safe.  That devil’s trap should have held.  I made it myself.”

“But it didn’t hold.  Why is that again?  My brother is lying here fighting for his life because you can’t manage a goddamn devil’s trap?  If I hadn’t come when I did my brother would be dead, Cas.  Again.  That might not mean much to you or to Heaven but it means a Hell of a lot to me!”

“Is that why you abandoned him?”  Blue eyes glittered in the fluorescent light. 

“Everything I’m doing I’m doing for him, Cas.  You used to know that.”  He shook his head.  “Bobby Singer’s on his way.  I’m sure you’ve got very important angel business to attend to that doesn’t involve worrying about petty things like humans.”  He glared.

“Stop trying to push me away, Sam.  Dean is my charge, and you are my –“

“I’m not your anything, Cas.  You made that very clear.”  He stood up.  “Neither you nor Bobby are even going to tell him that I was here, and you’re here now, so I’m going.  The nurses say he should wake up soon.”  Sam walked away.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Lilith meet.

It might have been nice if he’d heard Cas calling his name.  He might have turned around.  He might not.  It might have soothed the ache in his heart, a part he wished would just atrophy and die so he wouldn’t feel this way anymore.  But he didn’t hear Cas calling for him, and he didn’t really expect to either.  He texted Anna for a location to meet up and let her bring him back to Baltimore, where they met up with Ruby in the place she’d set up as a hideaway.  “It was Uriel,” she told them sadly.  “Uriel was the one who was murdering angels.  They refused to join his mission to free Lucifer.” 

“It goes further, doesn’t it,” Sam surmised dully.  He sat on the ground. 

“Orders are coming from as high up as it gets,” she nodded.  “Not all the angels know, and not all of them know everything.”  She stroked his hair gently.  “He specifically said that he intended to recruit Castiel into the cause, so at least he’s not part of the conspiracy.”

“He’s still not trying to stop it.” 

“Disobedience doesn’t come easily to angels, Sam.”  She gave him a sad smile.  “Remember that I had to cut out my grace to learn how, and even then they took time out of starting the end of the world to hunt me down.” 

He took her hand and squeezed it.  Maybe his heart was good for something after all.  “I’m not going to let them get you, Anna.” 

“I know.  We’re going to fight.  But Sam… “  She bit her lip.

“Yeah?”

“Have you given any thought to what happens next?”

“We kill Lilith.  I don’t think there really is a next.”

Ruby made a face.  “Sam, no.  Not okay.”

“It’s a fact.  I’m a single-use item.”

“No.  You’re not.  We’re in this mess because Heaven and Hell both decided that they wanted the same thing, and that’s just not supposed to happen.  Hell needs a ruler who isn’t going to dance to the tune that Heaven calls.”  She shook her dark head. 

He stood up and laughed.  “Ruby, no.  Literally anyone would be a better ruler than I would be, even if I wanted to rule Hell.  I can’t even stand up to my own brother, never mind freaking Heaven.  And besides, if I’d wanted that I would have gone along with Azazel when he tried to sell me that stuff before.  I’m not ambitious.  I’ve never been.”

“What about Stanford?  Wasn’t that ambition?” she shot back.

“That was about getting out of hunting.  Safety, stability.  Not becoming top dog lawyer at some white shoe firm or anything like that.”  He leaned against the wall.  “Besides.  I’m not a demon.  I don’t know what I am, I’m part demon, but I’m not a full demon.  Hell would never accept me.” 

“Lucifer’s not a demon either,” Anna pointed out, hugging her knees to her chest.

“He did make them.”  He dug his hands into his pockets. 

“Valid.  But you can’t just save the world and walk away, Sam.  There has to be a plan in place.  Someone has to take charge or we’ll be right back where we started.”  The angel shrugged apologetically.

“So Ruby, you can do it.  Or Zille.  Anna, if a fallen angel can rule Hell, why not you?” 

“Because I haven’t already collected a demon army around me, Sam,” Ruby pointed out, putting a hand on his shoulder.  “You seriously haven’t noticed how many more have come to you?  Do you just… not count them?  Because I know you’re talking to them, you’re bringing them on jobs and crap.” 

“I’m not… I’m not the guy you want, Ruby.  I screw up everything I touch.”  He faced the wall. 

“Just think about it, okay, Sam?”  She sighed. 

He did think about it.  He thought about it as he went about his usual training regimen, as he continued to adjust to the feeling of the power in his body.   It was like he had the fires of Hell contained inside his skin, which made no sense at all.  When he cut himself he still bled, and it was the same red blood with the same coppery taste as it always had been.  He’d always had the same hint of sulfur there, but there was no more there than had ever been present. 

He thought about it as he took an actual count of their numbers, and they really had increased.  They increased almost daily especially after Alastair’s death.  That wasn’t because of him, though – well, he had killed Alastair, but not alone.  He wouldn’t have gotten there without Anna, he wouldn’t have even known that he needed to go there without Anna.  He wouldn’t have managed to build up the strength to do it without Anna, without Ruby.  He would never have managed to get the whole operation off the ground without Zille and Pete, his first recruits. 

He would never have believed that he was capable of any of this without Cas. 

Lilith was running scared now.  She contrived to communicate with Sam using a ritual Ruby told him that he probably didn’t want to know about that she wanted to broker a deal.  It was a trap, it had to be a trap.  But when she said that she was willing to stand down from the seals and the Apocalypse in order to make this deal, he knew that he had to at least hear her out. 

He drove out to Indiana and met with her in the motel she designated.  He wasn’t sure what he expected if it didn’t include a swift decapitation, but she met him alone and honestly.  He could feel the hate rolling off of her, and to be honest he wasn’t much better.  Of course, he wasn’t a creature of pure hatred so there was that.  “You wanted to offer a deal?” he prompted without much preamble.  They’d met before of course, but she’d been in a different body and he hadn’t been so very, very open.  He could see her true face under the beautiful blonde she currently wore, twisted and jagged and scarred. 

“I do.  Much as it disgusts me to admit it, you’ve been causing me some problems lately.”  She snarled. 

“I guess taking out your right-hand man would probably tangle your ropes a bit,” he admitted, watching her carefully for any gathering of energy or other indication of treachery.  “What are you offering?”

“I stand down from the Seals,” she spat.  “The Apocalypse, everything.” 

He blinked.  “You mentioned that in your, uh, call.  Why would you do that?” 

The queen sneered and shifted her body, emphasizing her chest.  She couldn’t seem to decide what message she wanted to send, lust or overspilling hatred, so she was sending them all.  “I flipped ahead to the end,” she admitted.  “I’m not a big fan of how the story ends for me.  Turns out there aren’t as many perks to being Lucifer’s First as there should be.” 

“Mmm-hmm.  And in exchange you want?”

“Your head.  On a pike.  Dean’s too.  Can’t have him running around looking to avenge your sorry ass, can we?”  She saw him hesitate.  “You can’t really be so selfish as to hold your life against six billion people, Sam.  That’s not what I’ve heard about you, and my intelligence is very good.” 

Sam privately grimaced.  He suspected he knew exactly how good her intelligence was, but then again there was no proof that there wasn’t another double agent in his ranks.  “I don’t have the authority to make deals for Dean,” he pointed out.  “He’s very much his own man.  We’re not even together anymore.”  His mind whirled.  “You don’t really think I’m dumb enough to believe you’d hand me everything I want just in exchange for my life, do you?” 

“Honestly?  No.  But it’s the truth.  When I make a deal I have to keep it, it’s how these things work.  You can’t expect to take over as King if you don’t know this crap, Sam.”  She snorted.  “Did you think I wouldn’t figure that out?  I mean, it’s all over the place.  ‘The Prince Is Back!’”  She hissed.  “Please.  Give me a break.  Like you could ever hope to control Hell.” 

“I don’t really care about Hell,” he admitted. 

“Then what’s holding you back?  It’s not like anyone’s going to miss you.  Fine, I’ll take Dean off the table.  You’re right, he’s probably not going to care.  If you two aren’t running together anyway he’ll never even know the difference.”  She shrugged.  “Or is it that little angel on his shoulder that you’ve got your eye on?  Because believe you me, you have no chance there.  I know he helped you to spring your brother from Hell – oh yeah.  I know he was with you the whole time.  Only an angel could have put his meat back into his body like that.  But really, Sam.  It’s one thing to save a pure human like Dean, especially with everything that they want from him.  I mean, do you really think that even a fallen angel would even want to be in the same room with something like you?  You’re not even a real demon!  You’re a thing, a nothing.  With my solution you get to go out a hero, savior of the world.”  She stepped forward as she spoke, putting a hand on his chest.  “You’ll have done something even John Winchester thought wasn’t possible.  And you won’t have to live with the loneliness anymore.” 

He inhaled slowly.  There was no denying that her offer was tempting.  “What about my people?” 

She circled around him, trailing her hand as she went.  “Your ‘people?’  You mean the demons who turned on me to go sign up with the hot new thing in town?”

“Once the world’s not ending anymore there’s no quarrel between them and you,” he pointed out.  It was a lie, of course, at least for most of them.  Some of them would have hated Lilith anyway – there was a reason she’d never ruled Hell before despite being Lucifer’s First, and surprisingly misogyny had very little to do with it.  Some of them had been on board the Lilith train after Azazel’s death, but got disillusioned once they realized she was looking to end the world.  Others just saw which way the wind was blowing.  “And you’re going to need all the help you can get to keep your word to me.  After all, the angels will keep breaking seals and if you’re suddenly ready to get off this ride because of where it ends for you, I’m guessing that it involves you dying in some fairly spectacular way.  So… the angels are going to come gunning for you last.” 

She pulled her hand back, fury blazing in her eyes.  “You don’t know that.”

“You confirmed it just now.  I don’t give a rat’s ass about ruling Hell, Lilith.  Truly, I don’t.  I don’t care about Heaven, either and you’re right.  I don’t care if I die and your offer sounds pretty appealing for a lot of reasons that I don’t think you can even begin to understand.  But you can’t deliver, because it involves things that are outside your control.” 

She howled her rage and shot a ball of power, expressed as light as it had been back in New Harmony, at him.  He absorbed it.  “Is your memory going?” he asked, wrinkling his nose a bit.  “That whole thing?  Doesn’t work on me.  Are you sure you really want to do this now, Lilith?”  He started drawing his power in.

The door came crashing in.  He’d been so involved with his discussion with Lilith that he hadn’t paid attention to any other beings that might be approaching, so his surprise was unfeigned when Dean sprang into the motel room with his gun drawn.  A short guy with frizzy hair jumped in behind him and bellowed, “I AM THE PROPHET CHUCK!”

Sam looked at Lilith.  Lilith looked at Sam.  “I didn’t call for them,” he said, shaking his head. 

“Well don’t look at me,” she retorted. 

Dean preened.  “That’s right, bitch!”  He jerked his thumb at Chuck.  “A real-life prophet.  What are you going to do now, huh?” 

“I thought I’d start by flossing my teeth with his large intestine,” she replied, finally stepping away from Sam and earning points for creativity.  “Then I was thinking of snacking on his brains and maybe sucking the marrow from his left femur.”  Chuck made a pained sound as the demon approached him.

A light began to fill the room, a thousand times brighter than anything he’d ever seen.  He raised his arm to shield his eyes, only to see Lilith smoke out and flee.  The light faded.  “How about that!” Dean chuckled.  “That Cas is one clever son of a bitch, I’ll give him that much.” 

Sam rounded on his brother.  “Dean, what the Hell are you doing here?” 

The elder Winchester flashed him a cocky grin.  “Saving your ass as usual, Sammy.” 

He closed his eyes and shook his head, using the gesture of frustration to force his eyes back to hazel.  He’d barely gotten the hang of knowing the difference between how one or the other state felt.  “Dean, really –“

“Dude, she was about to unleash on you!  I saw that blast from under the door!” he yelled. 

Sam forced himself to relax.  “I was about to kill her, Dean.  End of the Apocalypse.  End of everything.” 

Dean’s look was pitying.  “Sure you were, Sammy.  Come on.  Let’s go grab a burger and catch up.” 

He wanted to resist.  He did.  But this Chuck guy, he grabbed Sam’s arm and nodded, just a little bit.  Sam bit back on his objections and left.  He could always take off again when he needed to. 

They went to a nearby diner.  Dean got, as expected, a burger.  So did Chuck.  Sam got a salad.  He mostly picked at it.  Chuck, as it turned out, really was a prophet.  The whole lightshow thing was an archangel protecting him from demons – a demon couldn’t be in the same room with a prophet without that defense mechanism kicking in.  “Is it a two-way street?” Sam inquired. 

“What do you mean?” Dean wanted to know, speaking around a mouth full of ground meat. 

“I mean, the angels obviously can sense that you’re around demons.  Can they hear what you’re saying, or what’s being said around you?” he clarified, poking at the one olive in the mix like he was trying to hide it from a defender.  Soccer seemed like it had been so long ago, even though he’d played at Stanford. 

Chuck pursed his lips and stroked his stubble thoughtfully.  “I hadn’t thought about it like that.  I don’t think so.  I mean, maybe.”

“Is that a problem?”  He waggled his eyebrows suggestively.  “You been up to dirty things you don’t want the angels to hear about Sammy?”

Dirty bad impure evil.  It wasn’t what Dean meant of course.  Not this time anyway.  That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt.  “Dean.”  He glared.

“I missed the bitchface, Sammy.  I really did.  I should take a picture and tape it to the shotgun seat for the next time you decide to run off and ditch me.”  The last four words came out like knife thrusts. 

“Not gonna stay where I’m not welcome, Dean.  You told me we were past the siren thing, but you lied.”  He folded his lips together.  “Are we done here?” 

“Sammy, Jesus.  Listen.  I’m just trying to reach out here, okay?  Look.”  He sighed.  “Chuck here is a writer.  It’s how I found him as a prophet – it turns out he’s been writing a series based on our lives.”  He waved a hand between them.  “Like, all of our lives.  Every detail.  It’s all there.”

“The publisher went bankrupt after I published the one where Dean went to Hell,” Chuck added, seeing Sam freeze.  “I’ve still been writing, though.  It’s not like I can freaking stop.  It’s how we found you today.” 

“Which you did why again?”  Sam looked up. 

Dean blinked.  “To stop you from making a deal with Lilith.  I mean, Chuck saw it happening.” 

He sighed.  “So when I had visions, they were either crap and could be safely ignored, or they were evil and I had to try to prevent them from happening at all.  This guy, because they come from Heaven, they’re all good?”  He massaged his own face.  “Dean, Lilith called me there to offer a deal.  You’re right.  And it was a tempting deal, sure.”

“Not worth your soul,” the blond vowed.  “Trust me on this.”

“Actually my soul was safe.  No one has ever wanted that, remember?  It’s too tainted even for Hell?”  Chuck opened his mouth and closed it again.  “She offered to stand down from the Seals.  All I had to do was die.  Complete oblivion in exchange for saving the world.”  He grinned.  “Sounds pretty perfect, right?  And I told her no.  Because she couldn’t deliver.  Even if she stands down from breaking the seals, she’s not the only one breaking them.  Angels are doing it too, Dean.”

He scowled.  “No way, Sam.”

“Yeah, Dean.  Uriel was one of them.  He’s the one that sabotaged the devil’s trap and let Alastair out, put you in the hospital.”  He gave a thin little grin.  “I’m sorry.  I hate to be the bearer of bad news; I know how much faith you’ve invested in them.  But angels are no better than demons.  They’ve just got better PR.”  He bit his lip.  “I’m sorry.” 

“I’m sorry you don’t have any faith, Sam.  Cas told me Uriel was rotten.  It doesn’t mean they all are.”  He shook his head.  “You can’t go off on your own like this, Sam.  You’re using your powers, you know that’s wrong.”

“Why?  Because they’re not human?”

“Exactly.  See?  If you know they’re not human you know you have to fight to stay as human as possible, Sam!  We’ve been over this!”  There were tears in his eyes, Sam could see them shimmering in the lighting that hadn’t been updated since the Eisenhower administration.  “I can’t sit here and let you turn into a monster.”

“I have to do what needs to be done to stop the world from ending, Dean.  I’m sorry that you can’t see that.”

“You’re not the one who’s going to stop it, Sam.  The angels –“

“Aren’t helping, Dean.  Look.  The abilities I have, they’re part of me.  I didn’t ask for them, they’re part of something that was done to me.  But they’re here.  They’ve helped more people than you know.  Maybe they do make me a monster and like I said before, if you decide you want to take me down because of them that’s fine.  Just wait until after we’ve stopped the whole Apocalypse thing to do it, okay?”

“Dean.”  Chuck cleared his throat. 

Sam’s older brother sighed.  “Okay.”  He bit the inside of his cheek and looked away for a moment before rearranging his face into something that would have resembled jocularity on someone who didn’t know him as well.  “So.  Uh, I mentioned that Chuck has our whole lives laid out in his books.” 

Sam nodded.  “Yeah, Dean.  So?”  He gave the prophet an apologetic shrug.  “I mean, we’ve already lived them once.  Were they really such great lives that we really need to go living them again?”

He raised his eyebrows and grinned.  “I learned an awful lot about you, Sammy.” 

“Okay.  Like what?  I was a mathlete?  I like Pearl Jam?  My favorite color is purple?  What does any of that have to do with anything?”

“I found out you like boys, for one thing.”  He wiggled his eyebrows again.  He’d gotten fond of that gesture since Sam had been gone.  “All these years and I had no idea you were gay, Sammy.”

“I’m not gay.  I’m bisexual.  I like men.  I like women.”  He paused.  “I probably like other genders too, I just haven’t really had an opportunity to find out.”  He shrugged.  “Is that a problem?”

Dean deflated a little.  “What?  No!  Of course not.  I just… were you ever planning to come out to me?” 

“Dude.  We lived in one room – one car- for most of our lives and you didn’t notice I was checking out guys just as often?  I didn’t think I needed to.  I figured you already knew.”  He forced himself to chuckle a little and met Chuck’s eyes.  The guy shook his head, almost imperceptibly.  He hadn’t included anything about Sam’s relationship with Cas, then. 

Why was Sam so relieved by that?  Part of him wished that the guy had forced Cas’ hand, outed them to Dean and the world.  He immediately felt guilty about it.  Dean didn’t deserve to have that comfort taken away.  Whatever he was getting from Cas, comfort or validation or whatever, he deserved.  He’d suffered, he needed help. 

“I just… figured you were comparing yourself to them.  Like, a lot of guys do that.”  He looked uncomfortable for a moment.  “Damn it, there goes all my big-brother teasing.” 

“Oh darn.  So you seem to have made a full recovery.” 

“From?”

“Alastair?” 

“How did you – oh yeah, the nurses mentioned that you stayed with me in the hospital.  Said it was my brother, anyway.  I wasn’t sure it was you since you told the nurses when you were in the hospital that you didn’t have a brother.  Or an uncle.”  He fixed him with a stare.

“You were trying to hunt me down and ‘bring me back into the fold’ or whatever at the time.”  He shrugged.  “The difference is that I’m the one who brought you to the hospital, so I got to be the one to tell them the facts there.” 

He frowned.  “You brought me there?  Why didn’t someone tell me?”

“Because they didn’t want you to know,” he said, leaning forward, “that even though I’m a monster, and a freak, and everything that you hate, I’m still your brother and I’m always going to look out for you.”  Sam got up and pulled out some cash for the salad, ignoring his brother’s stricken look.  “Look it’s been real, but I’m not so keen on getting hit on the head and dragged off to Bobby’s panic room either.”  Dean looked sheepish.  “Take care of yourself, Dean.  Watch your back.” 

“You know, Cas was really upset after that last incident.  I didn’t know why.  Did you say something to him?”

“I pointed out that you wouldn’t have gotten hurt if it weren’t for him.  Which is the truth.  Why?” 

“I mean, I never even saw the two of you even spend more than a few seconds in a room with each other but he really, really wanted me to bring you back home.  I figured that he wanted me to bring you back to keep an eye on you.  I mean, powers and everything, the secrets, the sneaking around –“

Sam held up a hand.  “I get it, you don’t trust me.  Your point?”

“Do you think maybe he just feels bad that you’re gone?”

He laughed out loud.  He knew that the sound was harsh, and grating, and so painful to hear that several patrons turned to stare.  He leaned back down to the table and pitched his voice so that it would not carry.  “Dean, I’m demon-blooded trash.  No.  No, Castiel does not feel bad that I’m gone.  He wanted you to bring me home because he wanted you to keep an eye on me.  That’s all.  If you don’t believe me, go ahead and ask him yourself.  See what happens when you make an angel laugh so hard he falls from heaven and bruises his goddamn wings.”  He stalked out of the diner, leaving a stunned Dean in his wake. The prophet would not be abandoned.  “Sam!” he called as Sam marched down the road.  “Sam!”

He turned to face the smaller man.  “Hi, Chuck.  Sorry you had to witness all our family drama.”  He grimaced.  “I mean, ever.” 

Chuck laughed a little.  “Yeah.  That’s a lot of drama for such a small family.”

“Winchesters never do things by halves.” 

“No, no you don’t.  I just wanted to check in and see if you’re okay.  I mean… that was kind of intense.”  He looked into Sam’s eyes.

“I’ll be fine.  It doesn’t matter.  It’s all going to be over soon anyway, right?  I mean, the whole Apocalypse thing?” he added hastily.

He wasn’t fooling anyone.  “I know it doesn’t feel like it right now, but this whole thing doesn’t need to end with your death, Sam.” 

“But it could.  I mean, that option is on the table,“ he added when Chuck stared in horror, and then shrugged.  “It’s not like it matters.  Whatever happens happens, as long as we stop the Apocalypse, right?”

“It matters to some people.  Your followers, for one.” 

He flinched.  “Can we maybe not call them that?  It’s kind of creepy.”

“They believe in you, Sam.  They’ve chosen you.” 

“And they’ll choose someone else when I’m gone, or when I make a decision that they don’t like.  They’re demons.  They’re a lot like humans that way.”  The pair of them shared a laugh.  “They like the idea of this Boy King or whatever.  I’m not important.  They’ll like Zille just as much.” 

“Anna and Ruby will care.” 

“For a while.  Look, Chuck, I appreciate the ‘it gets better’ talk but I’m not looking for an exit here.  I’m just looking to solve the problem of the Apocalypse.”  He paused.  “I’m guessing you left some pretty major stuff out of the drafts you’ve got sitting around.”

“About you and Cas getting Dean out of Hell?  Oh yeah.  An angel named Zachariah was pretty insistent about that.  But I know all about it.  I mean, I had to watch, you know?”  He sighed.  “I know how you feel about Cas, Sam.”  When Sam opened his mouth to object, he held up a hand.  “Prophet, remember?  And I get that you’re angry about the way you’ve been treated.  You should be.  It’s pretty shitty.  But you still love him.  You still miss him and you still want him.”

“Doesn’t matter, Chuck.”  He was getting tired of repeating the same phrase.  “All that matters –“

“Yeah yeah.  I know.  But hear me out.  Rebellion is almost impossible for an angel.  It takes a lot of effort.” 

“Damn it, I gave him everything he asked for.  How much more effort can I put in?” Sam exploded.

“Not that kind of effort, Sam.  I mean, you have been pushing him away as hard as you could ever since he said it was best if Dean stayed in the dark for now, but that’s neither here nor there.  I mean the act of rebellion takes actual mental and physical effort.”  He put a hand on Sam’s bicep, then thought better of trying to offer comfort through touch.  “I’m just saying.  Anyway, it was nice meeting you, Sam.” 

Chuck went back into the diner.  Sam went back to his car and started the long drive back to Baltimore. He explained the encounter with Lilith to his inner circle of colleagues – he could not bring himself to call them followers, even though Baltimore could now be safely said to be crawling with demons.  Ruby threw a pillow at him.  “Damn it, Sam!  You could have been killed!”

“But I wasn’t,” he reported.  “Look.  We’ve got to take the fight to her.  Whatever happens, in the end even if she manages to free Lucifer it’s not going to work out well for her.  She said she’s seen that somehow, right?  So that tells me that we need to get rid of her before she finishes breaking the seals, and then we can turn our attention to the angels.”

“If we take over Hell,” Zille nodded, “we’ll have a better stronghold to fight from.” 

“We still only have two people who can actually fight angels – three, if someone feels comfortable using Uriel’s sword,” Anna objected.  “And Sam’s powers haven’t really been tested against an angel!” 

They evaluated their options against angels while continuing to try to save seals and track Lilith.  The news wasn’t entirely bad.  Some of the defectors had advance knowledge of the seals Lilith preferred to hit, so they had more success than they might have otherwise had.  Defections increased, giving them an even larger army. Meg joined them.  Sam couldn’t forget how he’d been made to take a back seat in his own body, but he couldn’t forget how she’d helped them get Dean back either. 

She even gave him a gift: two hellhound puppies.  He probably shouldn’t have been as excited by that as he was, but as soon as those little hot, sulfur-breathing noses shoved their way under his hand he couldn’t resist giving them scritches and shoplifting a couple of rubber toys for them.  They responded well to commands, too, at least from him.  Ruby was less enthusiastic when Sam was the only one who could get them to leave her boots alone but even that was some consolation. 

They went to Louisiana on the chance that a seal might be there, near Ruston.  Sam took the pups because it wasn’t like he could leave them with one of the others, not without transferring ownership.  They made the trip more enjoyable at least.  He tried to imagine the hellhounds in the back of the Impala and managed a chuckle.  The seal turned out to involve the desecration of a church that had been a place of refuge.  Sam felt more peaceful for even being on the grounds of the place, even though it could barely be described as in use anymore.  He had ten demons with him, all of whom looked vaguely uncomfortable.  Sacred ground, then.  There wasn’t much of that left on US soil anymore.  “Be ready,” he warned them, as the skin on his arms began to prickle.  “This isn’t going to go well.”

How “not well” became apparent pretty quickly when three angels in suits appeared before him, holding a struggling young girl in their arms.  “Fall back!” he ordered.  Only one of them had an angel blade, and that was Meg.  He had left the pups in the car, fortunately.  He’d only had them for a short time but he’d gotten attached. 

Demons vanished, as he’d intended.  He didn’t have time to think about that now.  He’d trained with one angel and managed to take her only half of the time.  The first, envesseled in a muscular soldier-type, approached and tried to lay a hand on his head.  He recognized that as prelude to a smiting.  He also didn’t bother with a Standard Evil Villain Monologue, showing himself to be a lot smarter than a good ninety percent of the foes that Sam found himself fighting on any given day.  Sam had no time.  He reached out with his mind and pulled as hard as he could.

Exorcising an angel was nothing like exorcising a demon.  Demonic hosts weren’t attached to their violators; they never resisted.  Angelic vessels had consented to their condition, and that detail apparently made a difference.  The two were fused in such a way that teasing out which part was human and which was angel seemed insurmountable.  He didn’t care if he hurt the angel.  The human so attached, on the other hand, was a victim.  He was a victim of Sam’s attack if nothing else, and he wanted to minimize the damage if he could.  Still, it was the end of the world and that demanded hard decisions. 

Something stabbed through his shoulder from behind and he grunted in pain.  It didn’t matter how often he got stabbed, it always hurt.  The sound got drowned out as the vessel he was exorcising and the angel occupying it screamed in unison.  Bright light – off-white, almost pink – filled the space along with a terrible wind blowing toward the sky for about three seconds.  Sam blocked his eyes with his arm, hoping that Meg and the random girl had the sense to do the same. 

When he opened his eyes he noticed that both women had displayed their intelligence and blocked their eyes.  Meg had also stabbed one of the angels with her angel blade, leaving a sprawled-out vessel in the middle of charred wing impressions.  The third angel gaped in terror.  “You are an abomination,” she spat out, pointing at Sam in accusation.  Her finger shook.  “You’re a murderer!”

He reached out with his mind.  “It’s been said.  But you’re the one who came here to torture a teenager to death.” 

“My orders come from Heaven.  It is God’s plan!”

“Do you really think the God who commanded you to love humanity, to serve humanity, would command you to torture an innocent girl?  That sounds an awful lot more like our side of the coin to me.”  He gestured to himself and Meg.  “And even we aren’t doing that.  Give us the girl and you’ll be free to go.  But you’re not going to break this seal.” 

“God has commanded this,” she repeated, but she lowered her hand.  The terrified teen raced forward to hide behind Sam.  Evidently she’d decided that he was probably the lesser of two evils, because he was not the one who had kidnapped her and was the one who had helped to rescue her or something.  He supposed he also made a convenient barrier to hide behind. 

“Did you hear the orders come from Him?” Sam asked her gently.  Now that he wasn’t actively fighting his shoulder really hurt, but he couldn’t let it show.  “Or did they come from Zachariah?”  He pulled the name randomly out of memory, thanks to the words of the prophet he’d met, but they seemed right.  “What’s your name?”

“Hannah,” she admitted after a moment. 

“Hannah, I know this is hard for you.  But some angels have already begun to question, and they’ve started to act for themselves.  And what they’re doing is giving orders that line up with what Lucifer would want.  Not God.  And if you look, really look, I think you can spot the difference.  I’m not asking you to rebel.  I know that doesn’t tend to go well.  But look.  See for yourself.  See who the real rebels are, and your conscience – your own knowledge of your own Father – will tell you the truth.” 

She paused.  “I will think about what you’ve said, Sam Winchester.”  She bit her lip, an amazingly human gesture from someone who was clearly not human.  “You frighten me.” 

“I frighten myself.  I hope we meet again under better circumstances.”  He knew that wouldn’t happen, but he wanted to make it clear to her that he had faith in her ability to choose well. 

She disappeared.  Sam turned to the teenager behind him.  It took a little while to help her come up with a convincing story about her kidnapping and rescue – a version of the truth that had the angels as deluded individuals who believed themselves to be saving the world, but turning on each other instead.  One of them had stabbed Sam when he and Meg arrived to help.  They brought her and the catatonic former vessel to the hospital along with Sam, who needed help for his shoulder.

The police were interested in his statement, but the poor terrified girl was so convincing a witness and Sam and Meg played their roles so perfectly that they bought everything.  He needed a transfusion and stitches in his shoulder, but somehow there wasn’t any lasting damage to the joint itself.  It seemed almost miraculous, even though Meg would need to drive all the way back to Baltimore. 

He paid a visit to the former vessel, now and probably forever a John Doe.  He had been remanded to the psych ward for lack of anything else to do with him; no doctor could identify a cause for his state.  The staff wasn’t supposed to give details of course, but Sam could be very persuasive when he chose to be.  And he had been involved with the “Heroic Rescue,” right?  Apparently the guy didn’t speak.  He showed no response to speech, although he didn’t seem to be deaf either.  He stared at the television without seeming to notice what was on or respond to it in any way – C-Span or Cartoon Network, it didn’t matter.  He had to be fed, but he didn’t have any trouble chewing or swallowing.  He went where he was led.  He sat when he was positioned to sit; he lay down when he was gently pushed down onto the bed. 

Sam had done this to him.  He had reached out with his brain, grabbed onto the thing that the human had allowed to occupy his body and yanked it out and this was the result.  He might recover.  He might not.  Could the angel have been ejected without destroying the vessel like this?  Could he have left voluntarily?  Sam didn’t know, but he hadn’t bothered to find out before tearing him out like some kind of animal tearing at its prey.  What kind of monster was he?

“There was nothing else you could have done if you wanted to save the seal,” Meg told him, coming up behind him and putting a hand on his arm. 

He turned to face her.  “I know.”  He ran his good hand through his hair.  The other arm was in a sling, the doctors being concerned about the integrity of his stitches.  “And I guess I can’t really regret it.  I mean, end of the world, right?  Better that one guy should suffer instead of the entire planet?  But I still can’t help but feel pretty shitty about it.” 

“That’s what makes you one of the good guys, Sam.”  She smirked.  “Don’t worry.  We love you anyway.”  She stroked his back affectionately.  “Come on.  Let’s go home.” 

Home.  What a thought. 

They drove back to Baltimore with the dogs, who were distinctly unenthusiastic about the sling and apparently thought that the correct solution was to repurpose it for games of tug.  He couldn’t help but laugh. 

Back in Baltimore Anna healed his shoulder completely.  He described the vessel’s condition and she grimaced.  “Most vessels don’t get left behind in great condition,” she admitted.  “Most don’t get left behind in a condition to survive at all.  It depends on the angel in question of course, but the typical human body wasn’t meant to hold the energy that an angel is.  Some humans are built to contain specific angels; they fare better.  And then there are rare individuals who can just, you know, take it.”  She shrugged.  “You come from a line of vessels, actually.  Archangelic vessels, on both sides.”

“Is that why I can access the power of Hell?” 

“Probably not.  I think that comes from Azazel, how he shaped you and you not fighting it.  But I think that you not exploding under it, that comes from the whole vessel thing.  Maybe.” 

Dean showed up two days later.  Sam opened the door when he knocked, but he almost closed it again.  Twenty demons stood up and grabbed their weapons when he gasped out his brother’s name, and the pups started to growl.  Dean turned pale and started to sweat, but he held his hands up.  “I just want to talk, Sammy,” he told him after swallowing hard.  “That’s all.  Maybe outside?  Without the, uh, you know…”

“Sorry, Dean.  They’re kind of attached to him,” Meg smirked.  “And we’re a little leery of leaving him alone with you.”

“We know you want to drag him back to South Dakota with you,” Ruby added, coming to stand on Sam’s other side.  “Lock him in that cage in the basement like some kind of animal.”

“No.”  Dean shook his head.  “I don’t.  I did,” he admitted with an incline of his head.  “I mean, I’m not going to lie, I spent how many years believing God knows what about you and your powers and crap.  I’m still not… I mean, I know you’re good, Sammy.  I’m just not…  Look, can I come in?  I promise not to try to kick, hit, stab, shoot, strangle, maim or otherwise harm anyone in this building.”  He glared at Ruby.  “Even you, buttercup.  Look, I can’t even do an exorcism without a book.  The last time I tried I ordered a pizza.”

“It’s true,” Sam acknowledged with a sideways toss of his head.  “He even ordered extra anchovies.  He hates anchovies.”  He moved aside and gestured toward what had once been a kitchen.  “We can chat in there.  There’s even beer.” 

“Oh thank God.”  Sam watched his brother walk into the back room.  He knew his brother’s walk well enough to know how uncomfortable he was, even though he would rather die than show it.  “I figured you’d be up to baby blood by now or something like that.”

“That’s Lilith.  Not me.”  He stifled a grin as the pups began to show an interest in Dean’s loose shoelace.  “So Chuck gave you my location, huh?” 

“Yeah.  I had to beg him, Sammy.  I had to talk to you.”  He sipped from the beer Sam gave him.  “Sam, I’m sorry.”

If Dean had just announced his intention to join the priesthood Sam could not have been more astonished.  “Sorry?  For what?”

“For being a dick.  When I got back.”  He looked away.  “I was messed up, man.  What I saw down there, what was done to me – what I did –“

“It’s not your fault, Dean,” he murmured.  “You were in Hell.  It’s Hell.” 

“Yeah.  Well.  I mean, it messed me up.  And I was, I mean, I still had all this crap in my head, and then there were the angels and I heard what I wanted to hear and they encouraged it.  So yeah.  I was a dick, and I pushed you away.  And I’m sorry.” 

Sam managed a grin.  He wanted to feel warmer, fuzzier somehow.  He wanted to feel good, but somehow it seemed hollow.  It didn’t change the past year.  It didn’t change what needed to be done.  Still, it was something.  “Thanks, Dean.  Me too.”

“I, uh, I talked to Cas.” 

“Okay?”

“He told me everything.”  He took a deep breath.  Sam wished he could.  His entire being stilled as his brother continued.  “I mean, he told me everything.  He told me about how he got you to accept your powers.  How you and he…”

Sam made himself breathe again.  “Yeah.”

“And then how his superiors ordered him to stop.  And follow my lead.”  He gave a wry grin.  “As if I didn’t feel shitty enough about you leaving, Sammy.” 

He shrugged.  “He chose to obey.”  He looked at his brother.  “Why did he come clean now?  I mean, now of all times?” 

“I don’t know.  I really don’t.  But he did.  He didn’t seem like himself.  He seemed upset.  Desperate, almost.  He misses you, Sammy.  If an angel can love, I think he loves you.”  He grimaced.  “This is weird.  We’re Winchesters, you know?  We don’t really do love, or feelings or any of that crap.”  Sam nodded.  That was God’s own truth.  “I mean, do you love him?  Would you have him back?”

“It doesn’t matter, Dean.  I can’t have that.  It’s too late.  Either I fail and the world ends, or I succeed.”  He looked away. 

“Not okay, Sammy.”  Dean gripped his shoulders, hard enough to bruise.  “We will find a way, but I’m not losing you again.” 

Sam opened his mouth to reply but the sensation of grace suddenly appearing nearby stopped him.  He couldn’t count precisely, not without visual contact, but multiple angels had touched down nearby.  He knew two of them: Castiel and Hannah. 

He turned to Dean.  “Did you tell them where to find us?” he demanded, grabbing an angel sword from inside his jacket. 

“Maybe?” he hazarded.  “But Sam, it’s okay, he just wants to –“

“To show up with six angels looking to skin us all alive,” Sam replied bitterly.  “The angels have been breaking seals, Dean.  And you brought them to the only group saving seals.”  He stormed out to the front room, where the demons were preparing for a fight. 

“We’ve got company, boss,” Zille warned.  “Six angels, and Loverboy’s at the front.” 

“Noted,” he grunted, throwing open the door and gathering his power. 

The angels had arranged themselves in a pyramid structure, with Cas in the front.  None of them wore a suit, the typical angel uniform.  Cas himself had dressed in jeans and a tee shirt.  He met Sam’s eyes squarely and held his hands up.  “Sam,” he intoned.  His voice scratched at his throat.  “We are not here to fight you.” 

Hannah, on his right, spoke up.  “I looked, as you said.  You were right.  Our orders did not come from God.  We have come to join you.” 


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team resolves some issues.

Sam swallowed hard when he saw Cas at the door.  “I.  Cas,” he tried again. 

“No tricks, Sam,” he promised.  “You’ve already met Hannah.  These are Balthazar, Flagstaff, Nuriel and Hallel.”  He indicated his companions.  “We’re here to stop the Apocalypse.” 

Sam reached out with his mind and he found each angel open to him, open and honest.  “Okay.  Um, okay.”  He nodded.  “Thanks.  This is… this is really unexpected.  I’m not even really sure what to say, other than to welcome you to the fight.  It’s probably going to get pretty ugly.”  He barely registered Dean’s hand on his back

“Most fights do,” Balthazar commented, the first angel to break formation.  He stepped forward.  “They’re the only kind of fight worth having after all.” 

“Time is growing short,” Hallel informed, brown hair falling into her face as she circled around the others.  We must act decisively.  There are six seals left.”

Sam’s hands shook so badly that he had to put them somewhere, so he grabbed the hellhounds.  They enjoyed the attention.  “Okay.  I don’t suppose that you know where she is at the moment?”  He couldn’t take his eyes off Castiel.  He tried not to read anything into the fact that Castiel seemed to have a similar problem. 

“Sam, I have intelligence that needs to be shared with you and you alone,” the angelic leader told him.  “Is there any way that you would be willing to alter the warding on this place to allow the six of us to enter?  I have given you our names.” 

He considered.  “Do I have your word – from each of you,” he continued, fixing each of them with his gaze, “that you will let everyone within these walls live in peace, no matter who they are?”  Glancing from angel to angel made it easier to look away from the one he loved.  He could not, would not get his hopes up.  He learned from his mistakes and besides, the time for that had passed.  He tuned into Angel Radio to be certain, of course.  He wasn’t about to risk his people, to risk Anna, because he got distracted by his own weak heart.

“Of course,” Cas said after they conferred silently. 

Sam grabbed a can of paint from the pair of borrowed hands that offered it to him – he couldn’t even see the face to whom they were attached in the crowd – and added the appropriate sigils for those names to the wards.  He’d found lessons in Enochian online, of all places, and had never been so grateful for new-agers obsessions in his life.  “Come on in then.” 

That was when Castiel caught sight of Anna.  He made his way through the crowd of demons to stand before her.  Everyone held their breath, even though only two people present even really needed to breathe.  Ruby’s face darkened and she moved toward her lover’s side, but Anna needed no defending.  Castiel dropped to one knee and took the redhead’s outstretched hand.  “Sister, I have wronged you.  Please forgive me.”

She smiled gently and caressed his face.  “Disobedience is hard, Castiel.  I’m glad that you’ve chosen for yourself.  Congratulations.  I’m happy to have you at my side again.”  She helped him to his feet.  “I believe you wanted to speak with our fearless leader.” 

Sam snorted.  He was anything but fearless. 

Dean cleared his throat with unusual delicacy.  “Does Sam have an office somewhere, or maybe just a room of his own that they could go to if they wanted to talk privately?”

Ruby glared at Cas for a moment.  “No.  He doesn’t actually.  He tends to kind of sack out in whatever room he’s in when he can’t keep his eyes open.”  She relented.  “Maybe somewhere offsite would be best.” 

“I can arrange that,” Castiel offered.  “If you’re willing.” 

Breathe in, Winchester, he ordered himself. It’s a meeting, not anything more.  You can do this.  You’re not some twelve-year-old kid.  “Sure,” he told the angel.  “Let’s go.”  Cas took his arm and within moments they were in what Sam thought was probably a hotel room.  The place was nice – kind of minimalist in terms of décor, but probably the single cleanest place that wasn’t a hospital or a lab that Sam had ever been in.  Castiel released him the moment they touched down, but the warmth of his handprint lingered. He rubbed his arm and paced across the room, not looking at Cas. “So what’s this intelligence you wanted to share so badly?” 

Cas sat down in the easy chair and Sam spun to look at him as he spoke.  “It’s about the seals.  Specifically it’s about Lilith.  I confronted Zachariah about why he had wanted me to delay going after Lilith, why he wanted to keep you from going after her until the last minute.  It’s true – Dean was never supposed to be the one taking her on, Sam.  His role was to be a vessel for Michael after Lucifer was freed.”

Sam staggered back.  “No.  Oh, no.  No no no.”

“That was my reaction.  Well, with less of the jaw moving part but I felt similar horror.  Hannah approached me after she spoke to you and I spoke with him.  He confirmed everything.  He is working to forward the Apocalypse.  I don’t know if Michael is giving him orders or if he is ‘showing initiative.’”  He gave a bitter smile.  “I have been such a fool.”  He slumped backwards.  “You were always intended to kill Lilith.  Just not until she had broken the other seals.  When you stepped up your activity angels had to become involved with breaking seals as well.”

Maybe it was the way he slouched, almost human in despair.  Maybe it was just Sam’s own need that drew him to the angel, made him put a hand on his shoulder.  “What are you saying, Cas?”

“I’m saying that Lilith is the final seal, Sam.  If you don’t destroy her before the rest of the seals are broken she will release Lucifer.  She may destroy herself to accomplish the goal, or an angel may do the job, I don’t know.”  He looked up and met Sam’s eyes.

“She’s flipped to the end of the book,” Sam remembered.  “She knows how the story ends.”

“Exactly.  That’s why Chuck was encouraged to warn Dean, make him think you were going to sell out to her.  It was to prevent you from killing her to soon.  And it’s why I gave Dean the hint on how to drive her off, using the prophet.  I am not proud of that role that I played.  I knew that it was manipulative, and that was wrong.  But Sam, I had no idea why.” 

“I believe you, Cas.”  He sighed.  “So basically we have to kill her, um, yesterday.” 

“Tomorrow should suffice, Sam.  Time travel is draining and not to be used lightly, especially going into a major battle where any of us may be seriously harmed.”  He put a hand on Sam’s. 

“It’s a figure of speech, Cas.”  He couldn’t help but grin. 

“Oh.  I suppose I’ll learn these things in time.”  One small corner of his mouth twitched, and Sam’s chest tightened enough to hurt.  There wasn’t going to be time.  Not for Cas to learn Sam’s little speech patterns, anyway.  “I never wanted to hurt you, Sam.  I know that I did.  And I am sorry.  I believed that I was working to stop the end of the world.”

“I know you did, Cas.”  He heard his voice breaking. 

“I’m hurting you still.”  He tilted his head to the side.  “I can’t take back the past several months, Sam.  I can’t give you back what I took.  But I can offer you someone now who loves you unconditionally.  Wholly.  Every part of you, even the parts of you that have done things you’d rather not have done.” 

He stepped back.  “Cas,” he tried, and cleared his throat to try again.  “Cas.  Did you rebel… for me?”

“No.  I rebelled because it was the right thing to do.  I came to you because you’re doing the right thing, Sam.”  He rose, but did not approach his quarry.  “I confessed to Dean for you.  Because you deserve better than to be hidden away.  Dean wouldn’t be free, wouldn’t be alive if not for you and what your abilities did.  You are not someone to be ashamed of and I regret making you feel that way.  I regret that my words and actions encouraged Dean to make you feel that way.”  He looked away. 

Sam shook.  On the one hand, he’d gone through so much.  Cas truly had used and discarded him, and the fact that he hadn’t wanted to or had the best of motivations in no way made up for the fact that Sam had gone through the past year being ostracized by everyone he knew and feeling like garbage.  Believing that he was garbage, turning himself into a weapon.  A single-use object, as he’d described himself.  And yet – how difficult must this not be for Castiel?  It must have physically hurt to make that decision to turn away from everything he’d ever known, from an eternity of orders and hierarchy, and move toward self-direction.  Sam knew plenty about that himself.  And emotion – angels weren’t given to emotion.  It wasn’t that they didn’t feel emotion, Anna had explained it.  They simply suppressed it, because it interfered with order and with obedience.  For this angel – one who had been trusted with some of the most important missions in the Apocalypse – to turn around and start expressing his feelings and to leave Heaven and bring five buddies with him – shouldn’t that be rewarded?  Shouldn’t someone, somewhere, let him feel that he’d gotten something for his trouble? 

Or was that Sam’s own desire slipping in, his own neediness, his own desperation to be wanted and cared for even though it could only ever be temporary now?  Was it even okay for him to take a little bit of comfort with someone else after what he’d done, with who his companions were?  He was going to stop the Apocalypse, after all, or die trying.  Was it such a bad thing if he let himself feel a little bit of happiness before it all went dark on him? 

He stepped forward again and touched Cas’ face.  “It’s okay, Cas.” 

“It’s not okay,” he said.  “But I want to make it up to you.”  He closed the distance between them and kissed Sam.  His kiss was light, almost tentative.  For a moment Sam was afraid that Cas wasn’t really interested at all, that he was just faking it for Sam’s sake like a last meal for a condemned man.  But no.  His large blue eyes were focused on Sam, alert, hopeful.  Sam took him into his arms and gave a more thorough demonstration that there was no need to be hesitant. 

Castiel responded as though all he needed was that sign, that little indication that Sam was willing to allow him back.  He guided them gently toward the bed and pulled Sam down into a sitting position.  His mouth moved from Sam’s mouth to his neck, where he began to nibble just hard enough to get a response from Sam.  “How did you know –“ he demanded, biting back on a groan as the angel help him off with his flannel shirt. 

“I’ve done research,” he admitted, taking the time to shed his own tee shirt as he spoke.  “Instructional videos.  Your brother recommended some.” 

The thought of Dean providing his lover with “instructional videos” of any kind threatened to kill the mood entirely for Sam, but Cas managed to bring it back when he tugged Sam’s tee shirt over his head.  His hand began to explore Sam’s body, first above the jeans, then once Sam had gotten over his surprise at the angel’s forwardness beneath.  Maybe those videos had been informative after all, he thought wildly as Cas opened his jeans for easier access and finally just made them go away altogether. 

“I want to know what you taste like,” he told Sam. 

“Okay,” was all he could say, with an enthusiastic nod. 

As it turned out there were a lot of things Cas wanted to know about that night, and to try.  They tried them all.  Sam didn’t need much in the way of sleep these days, and to be honest nestled in the arms of the man he loved he slept better than he had in months.  In the morning they would need to go back to the house but that was okay.  And that was then. 

Morning still came too soon.  Cas zapped their clothes clean although Sam insisted that they take a proper shower.  They didn’t have time to dither, but he was willing to make time for this.  The hotel shower stall was large enough for it, after all, and apparently none of Dean’s “instructional videos” had included the important topic of shower sex.  This was probably the last time they were going to be together; Sam wanted to make sure that they did it right. 

When they got back to the house he met with his inner circle, now with extra angels and his brother.  None of the demons were at all enthusiastic about the presence of Dean Winchester in their midst.  “He exorcised me,” Pete pointed out. 

“And me,” Meg added. 

“Look.  We’ve all had our differences – I mean, I’ve done my share of exorcisms too,” Sam pointed out.  “But we’re talking about the end of the world here.  We need to put aside our differences.  I’ve got information.  Apparently we need to kill Lilith before the second to last seal breaks.  Otherwise she is the final seal and Lucifer rises.” 

Everyone froze.  “Crap,” Dean summarized. 

“More or less,” Sam agreed. 

“How are we supposed to track her down?  She’s hiding herself pretty well if I can’t find her,” Ruby objected with a toss of her hair. 

“I gave that some thought last night,” Sam began.

“Did you really?” Meg challenged with a wicked grin that earned more than a few snickers.  Even Balthazar snickered. 

Sam blushed a bit but let himself grin a little.  “I said some,” he protested as Cas put a hand on his back.  “It doesn’t take a lot of time to figure out that if you can’t find a demon’s location, you bring it to yours.”

Zille started laughing.  “You want to summon her.  Here.”

He shrugged.  “Maybe here isn’t the best idea, but somewhere.  If we can manage to summon her properly we can take her out when and where we want to.  Right now all she has to do is avoid us and take out five more seals of her choosing, which could be anywhere in the world.  If we bring her to us, we fix this.  Right here.  Right now.” 

Dean nodded.  “It makes good sense, Sammy.  I mean it’s dangerous – how do you summon Lilith?  But if she’s stuck in the middle of a devil’s trap she’s not running around snacking on babies or trying to end the world.  I like it.”

“The fight is likely to be powerful,” Hannah hummed.  “There must be somewhere else that we can do this.  I realize that this neighborhood is not the best, but the buildings are still too close together.” 

“What about Camden Yards?” Sam offered.  “I mean, the space is huge and the O’s are out of town right now.  Between some of the angels and some of the demons we can keep civilians out.”  He looked up at the others.  “Does this sound like a solid plan to you?”  No one could think of any objections, although Cas looked troubled.  “Alright.  We do this tonight.  The Apocalypse ends tonight.” 

They went through their list of preparations.  The components for summoning Lilith weren’t really all that different for summoning any other demon and were easy enough to come by between local occult shops and what Ruby kept on hand.  Late at night they broke into the stadium, made sure that the cameras were off and the facility was clear of any and all civilians and used the stadium’s white paint to create the devil’s trap and the sigils for the summoning.  Sam combined the necessary herbs and other substances in the bowl, added a match and repeated the words. 

It was funny how things had changed when it came to rituals and magic now that he’d accepted his own nature and abilities.  He’d never acknowledged the little surge that he felt when using a summoning ritual before, the little tug, but now he couldn’t ignore it.  He knew that Lilith felt the summons because he could sense her on the other end, but there was no immediate response.  His eyes narrowed and his followers stilled.  If this didn’t work all of his hard work would be for nothing.  The ritual created a connection, however tenuous.  He grabbed at that connection like a man with a rope or maybe a leash and he tugged.  Hard. 

Lilith appeared in the trap, still wearing the stunningly beautiful blonde she’d worn in Indiana.  “Rude much?” she scoffed.  Blue eyes rolled back in her head and were replaced with pure white.  “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do, Little Prince.”  She waved a hand and the devil’s trap disappeared. 

“I don’t think that there’s any real need to explain, Lilith,” he told her easily.  “You know why I’m here.”  The stars started to wink out of the sky overhead; demons approaching, backup for Lilith. 

“You have no idea what you’re up against,” she spat out.  “I’m going to rip you apart from the soul out.  I’m going to feast on your bones!” She fired off another of her blasts of light at him. 

He scoffed.  “I’ve heard that before.”  Her backup landed around her.  “Tell me, Lilith.  Not so long ago you were eager to back out to save your own skin.  What happened?  Why’re you so suddenly ‘up with Satan’ now?” 

“If I’m going to go out I might as well go out on the winning side,” she snarled.  “You’re the one that pointed out I was going to die either way, Sammy-boy.” 

“That’s true.”  He reached out and grabbed hold of the demon inside of her body and pulled.

Lilith was unlike any other demon he’d ever handled.  He guessed that made sense.  She was the oldest, the first demon to be crafted from a human soul.  Her spirit was massive, larger than Alastair by several orders of magnitude.  Despair filled him.  What the hell was he supposed to do with this?  He was just a man, not even twenty-five years old.  He’d seen things, done thing sure.  But nothing like this.  Touching her spirit was like immersing himself in the deepest tar.

She managed to push him out.  “Give it up, kid, and I’ll kill you fast.” 

All around him his people fought tooth and nail.  He saw Zille with her hands around another demon’s neck.  That demon had his claws, and they were claws, in the zealous demon’s stomach.  Blood dripped everywhere but her grip didn’t loosen.  Pete had grabbed a baseball bat from one of the dugouts and broken it over an enemy’s head. The enemy demon did seem to be somewhat afraid of the ash stake, so maybe there was something behind the reported protective qualities of ash.  Castiel had his hands full with one of Lilith’s larger henchmen, a guy Sam knew from intelligence reports as Malphas.  Dean had two demons to contend with, although he seemed to be holding his own.  Ruby was hacking her way through a slew of low-life Lilith supporters and Meg had a few of her own but the amount of blood seeping into the grass here at Camden Yards was astronomical and this, this was definitely going to affect the quality of play on the field. The grounds crew is going to be pissed about this, he thought to himself, maybe a little bit hysterically. Lilith finally seemed to grasp that her stupid light-beam attack wasn’t going to have much of an effect on Sam so she decided to change things up.  Instead of trying to attack him directly with her power she telekinetically sent second base flying at his head.  He managed to dodge, only to find the fiend right up and in his face.  She had claws of her own and they dug right into his gut. 

He gasped, because that hurt.  He reached out with a hand and grabbed her by the neck.  Maybe she did have a hand on his liver – was that his liver? – but he barely felt it right now.  Later he’d feel it, at least for a little while.  Right now it just helped him focus.  He wasn’t going to get any do-overs, he wasn’t going to get to try again later.  This was his only chance to get this right.  He reached out with his mind again and grabbed the spirit inhabiting the pretty blonde and he grabbed it.  She fought him, fought him even harder this time, but he held on even tighter.  If he wasn’t going to be able to do this again he had to finish it now.  He reached inside himself and he reached farther, into that reserve he’d drawn on to take down Alastair.  Into the place that had put the fire in his veins.  He grabbed onto that black smoke and he pulled, even as she tugged at things he couldn’t see inside his body. 

“You may save your precious humans,” she gasped out, the orange light show under her skin already starting up, “but you won’t live to enjoy it.” 

They were so close to each other now, wrapped up so tightly in each other that a casual observer would probably mistake them for lovers.  He leaned down and whispered in her ear.  “I don’t care.  The job’s done.”  A final tug and she was gone.  Her stolen body fell to the ground, rigor mortis already present.  The fall pulled her hand out of Sam’s abdomen and he hissed at the pain of the withdrawal.  He was no stranger to the sight of his own blood.   He grinned.  It was over.  They’d done the job, saved the world.  There had been times when it had seemed truly hopeless, but they’d pulled it off. 

His knees buckled beneath him.  Oh, right.  Blood loss and trauma – that stuff.  He fell to the ground slowly, not even bothering to brace for impact.  He wasn’t worried about a few bruises, after all.  He could feel his heart straining to move something, anything through his long limbs but the tearing and pulling had done their job.  Wetness pooled beneath him and to be honest it didn’t even hurt anymore.  The smile broadened on his face.  They’d saved the world.  Cas loved him, Dean had forgiven him, and there was a world for them both to mourn and heal in. 

Darkness rushed in, and he didn’t fight it at all.

He wasn’t sure what he expected.  Hell, probably.  Meg had said that their blood damned them and he had no reason to doubt her or to think he would be any different, but this didn’t look like any part of Hell he’d ever been in before.  He came to on a bright red flannel blanket in a huge circle of green grass that had been allowed to grow just a little too long.  The sun beat down from overhead and he would know that sun anywhere: California sun, the kind that seeps into your bones and makes every care in the world seem about twenty times lighter.  A forest of sunflowers stood guard around the refuge. 

He poked at the place where Lilith had gutted him, but there were no wounds in this place.  He felt fine, in fact.  The fatigue he’d carried around for years had disappeared.  So had the aches and pains of a thousand injuries deemed too minor for actual attention by the staff of the Winchester Family Clinic.  For the first time that he could remember, he felt okay. 

He turned around.  “Hello?” he called.  There was no one there.  “Hello?”

He sat back down on the blanket.  He kind of liked the blanket.  It was warm and red.  Maybe he didn’t need to leave the blanket after all.  He’d just saved the world.  Died doing it, too.  Maybe it would be okay for him to take a little rest here on the nice red blanket, in the sun among the sunflowers.  He couldn’t hear anything at all around him – no birds, no planes, no stupid lawnmowers.  He could always sleep some more.  He’d always said he could sleep when he was dead, and he had plenty to catch up on. 

He dozed off, and he had no idea how long he stayed that way.  It was nice here in the sun and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been able to just take some time just for him, just to relax and rest and be.  Eventually someone would come and tell him where to go and what to do.  Or not.  Maybe this was heaven, or as close to it as freaks got. 

“It’s not Heaven, Sam.”  The voice was Chuck’s and not Chuck’s at the same time.  He hadn’t heard anyone approach, or even felt someone coming near.  Chuck was just not there one moment and there the next, or at least it was Chuck’s body.  “It’s a nice place, though, isn’t it?”

He sat up again and glanced at his visitor.  “It’s beautiful.” 

“It’s Limbo.  Heaven is… well, Heaven is experiencing some technical difficulties right now.  I don’t think you’d want to be there right now.  It turns out that some of My angels were having some difficulty following some pretty simple instructions.”  He grimaced.  “Honestly, you think you can leave the oldest alone for five minutes and this is what you get.”

He paused for a moment.  “You’re riding Chuck.”  He couldn’t pause to think about it.  If he did, he’d get hysterical. 

Chuck’s face grinned.  “Even most angels can’t really look on My true face, Sam.  I can speak through My prophets.  This is just a little more direct.  I wanted to say thank you for your help with the whole Apocalypse thing.  You’ve made sure that can never happen – not that way, anyway, and that’s basically like taking all the major WMDs off the table so that’s a huge load off my plate.” 

Sam blushed.  “It wasn’t just me.  I mean, it was all of us.  Mostly demons, really.  They took a lot of risks.  Some of them gave up everything.  And it was Castiel who told us how to do it in the end.” 

God grinned.  “Oh yes.  Castiel.  The little engine that could.  What does that make it now, seven angels who figured out how to watch over humanity and guard them like I told them?  I know it took a while, but I’m glad you were willing to give him another chance, Sam.  He loves you.”

“He’ll get over it.”  Sam looked away.  Cas loved him, and he loved Cas.  “We both knew there was no future in it, by the end.” 

“I think there’s always some element of hope, Sam.  You hoped that there might be something when you and he got back from Hell, and it was only when his orders changed that you realized that wouldn’t happen.  And he hopes that something will happen now that Lilith is dead.”  He smiled again, gently. 

“I’m dead,” Sam pointed out.  “That mistake has already been made once.  What’s dead should stay dead.  It shouldn’t come back to hassle the living.”

“You brought your brother back.”

“He shouldn’t have died in the first place!  He only died because he sold his soul bringing me back.  It’s not like I even did anyone any good –“

“Sam, you saved the world.  You did all the good, okay?”  God patted his hand gently.  “Look, ordinarily I’d agree with you.  You’ve done a tremendous amount of work, and with what you’ve been through in your life I’m frankly kind of reluctant to do anything but encourage you to go to your Heaven and hang out enjoying every possible happiness.”

Sam drew himself up.  “Heaven?”

“Yeah, Sam.  Heaven.  You were there the first time you died too.  I know Meg thinks it’s her blood that condemned her in life, but she doesn’t remember the choices she made.  Not all of Azazel’s ‘experiments’ wound up in Hell.  Andy Gallagher is in Heaven.  So are Lily, and Scott Carey.  You remember them.” 

He hadn’t met Scott, but he remembered the name from having investigated his death.  “Okay.  Yeah.  You said ‘ordinarily.’”

He sighed.  “I did.  The problem I’m seeing is that I’m not exactly thrilled with the way Hell’s been run either.  It was never intended to be a place for torturers, you know?  I mean, yes, it was a place for souls to expiate their sins.  But even Lucifer was never supposed to be what he became.  He was supposed to show people choices.  Tempt them, sure.  That’s the whole thing about free will, Sam.  It’s only free will if they have other options. 

“I need someone in charge down there who isn’t going to get caught up in Heaven’s petty scheming.  Who doesn’t want power for the sake of power, and who doesn’t buy into the whole mythology thing.  I mean, Lilith bought into the Lucifer myth and she knew him, he’s the one who twisted her into a demon.  Azazel bought into the Lucifer myth and he knew him too, before the Cage.  He was a demon before Lilith – one of the Fallen, actually.”

“Really?”  Sam couldn’t help himself.  He leaned forward, into the conversation.

“Oh yeah.  There were a few.  Most of them were destroyed in that first war but a few remained.  Anyway, you’ve obviously got the talent for it.  They accept you.”

“I don’t know,” he demurred.  “I mean, there aren’t words to describe how not okay I am with the whole possession thing.” 

“And do you have any idea how many of your followers have taken willing hosts, or empty vessels?  Just to please you?  You’re already turning it into a place of redemption and you don’t even know it!”  He smiled expansively.   “You can make Hell into whatever you want, Sam.  It’s yours.  That’s why you’ve been able to draw on its power.”

He bit his lip.  “But I’ll still be apart from Cas.  And my brother,” he added. 

“No.  Not if they don’t want to be, and not if you don’t want to be.  You can go wherever you want, do whatever you want.  You’re not a demon.  You’re you.  You’ll have the ability to come and go as you please – from Hell, Earth, even Heaven if you want.  It won’t be easy, but nothing worth doing ever is.  And if it truly becomes too much, you can simply designate a successor and move on into your Heaven.  It’s written.” 

He sighed.  He didn’t want to leave his blanket.  “I need to talk with Cas,” he told Him.  Everything God was saying made perfect sense.  He didn’t want to do it, but he had an out.  And while he did kind of want to defer to Meg or Zille, if people would have accepted them as Queen Lilith would never have taken power.  “I can’t face another year like the last one, never mind forever.  But that’s not a no.” 

His eyes flew open.  He found himself still on the field at Camden Yards, cradled in both Cas’ and Dean’s arms.  He gasped in air, a wheezing groan.  “The two of you playing tug-o-war with me or what?” he croaked after a moment. 

They looked at each other, flummoxed.  “Sam?” Dean greeted, touching his face.  “You, uh, you okay, buddy?”

He took stock of his physical condition.  “I’ve been better.  I think it was a little touch and go for a minute.” 

They helped him into a seated position.  “Yeah.  Something like that.”  Dean met Cas’ eyes and shook his head minutely.  Did he really think he could keep a secret like this about Sam, from Sam again?  Seriously?  It was okay, though.  He’d make it okay.  He’d talk about things with Cas and see where they stood.  “Let’s get you out of here, get you someplace a little more comfortable.” 

“Let’s do that,” he nodded.  He let himself be helped to his feet and took stock of his state.  His body felt battered, there was no getting around that, and he was grateful for the help as he got to his feet.  He couldn’t help but feel different somehow, more aware.  He didn’t need to look around to feel that he’d lost people.  Pete, for example, had been killed.  Zille was hurt.  So was Ruby, who was being held up by Hallel.  Still, more of their people had been killed than his.  Dean seemed fine but appearances could be deceiving.  “Are you okay, Dean?” he wanted to know. 

“A couple of bumps and bruises,” he scoffed.  “Nothing’s broken.” 

Sam relaxed a little and he could sense it, hovering on the edge of his own consciousness.  This was going to take a lot of getting used to, if he allowed it at all.  “You have a concussion, Dean.” 

Cas frowned and reached out with one hand to stroke Dean’s forehead.  The sensation, like a computer pumping information directly into his brain, stopped.  “Thanks, Cas,” Dean said, glancing suspiciously at Sam.  “That helped a lot, actually.” 

They teleported back to headquarters.  Sam’s legs were a little steadier underneath him now, but Cas’ arm stayed around him to support him all the same.  No one said much.  People often thought that demons didn’t feel, that having their humanity stripped away meant that they no longer experienced emotion.  Nothing could have been farther from the truth.  They didn’t love as humans did, not most of them, but they cared for one another.  Given the right situation they could learn to love again, as Ruby did for Anna or in a family sense as Azazel had felt for Meg.  They felt loyalty.  They felt trust, and they’d lost people that they cared for and trusted.  People that they’d fought alongside. 

“So,” Meg began, crossing her arms across her chest as everyone watched.  “We won, right?”

“Yeah.”  The room spun as Sam spoke.  “We won.  I mean, we killed Lilith while seals held, so that’s it.  No Apocalypse.  I mean, I guess we could still have a demon-angel rumble if someone really wanted to, but Lucifer isn’t going to rise.”  He grinned and swayed a little. 

“We can maybe save the Q and A session until tomorrow,” Dean urged.  “Sammy’s a little beat, seeing as how Lilith apparently decided to rearrange his intestines or something.  Let’s let him go sleep it off somewhere and maybe talk about what happens next in the morning?”  He raised his eyebrows in a way that clearly meant to sell something. 

The demons exchanged glances.  “You’ll bring him back tomorrow,” Zille said flatly. 

“I promise,” Cas told her.  “He should sleep somewhere comfortable.  Not pass out over a book in a corner.”

“That’s his choice, not ours,” called out Darrell, who’d come over not long after Pete and Zille. 

“No, believe me, we get it,” Dean assured him.  “He’s been like that his whole life.  He’s just too big for me to carry to a bed now.” 

“Not for me,” Cas said grimly, and Sam blushed while the others snickered. 

He held on tight to Sam and the scene changed.  This time it was a different hotel, and the skyline had changed.  “Balthazar found this place and set it up,” the angel explained.  “I sometimes wonder about his scruples.  He is a brave and true warrior but I sometimes wonder if he is as focused on Heaven as he could be.” 

Well that was heartening.  “Cas –“

“Do you need anything?  A meal?  No, you’ve never been a strong eater.  Maybe some water?  Or a shower?  There are bathrobes in the closet.  They’re clean and entirely free of blood or gore,” he added pointedly.

He opened his mouth to object.  He didn’t want to take the time to shower, or to mess around with petty things like hydration or robes or clean clothes.  He needed to know where they stood.  If tonight was his last night on earth.  If he was going to take God up on his offer or if he were going to go back to that marvelous red blanket in a sea of sunflowers, forever.  At the same time, the blood drying on his skin itched.  It probably stank, too.  And his throat, now that he thought about it, begged for moisture.  “Both would be great.” 

Castiel helped him into the shower and simply waved his destroyed clothes away.  Sam idly wondered if he intended to return him to Demon Central stark naked or if Balthazar had made other arrangements.  A glass of tap water might have been the best thing Sam had ever tasted, and almost nothing had ever felt as good on Sam’s skin as the water did at that moment.  Cas even insisted on washing his body and his hair for him.  He was to do nothing for himself.  When his body finally woke up a little and recognized that the man he loved had his hands all over him Cas insisted on taking care of that too.  He wouldn’t even let Sam reciprocate.  “Cas,” he objected with a groan, “I want it to be good for you too.  That’s what being in love is about.”

“Sam, you died today,” his lover replied, pausing in his strokes for just a moment.  Sam hissed.  “You died saving the world, but you still died.  I want to… I want to show you how happy I am that you came back.” 

Sam made no further objections.  He was a little distracted, after all.  He let the smaller man dry him off, and comb his hair, and wrap him up in one of the large fluffy bathrobes and lead him to the huge king sized bed.  He even tucked Sam in properly before Sam grabbed his arm and pulled him down beside him. 

He kissed the angel, who took the kiss eagerly but pulled back after a moment.  “You need your rest, Sam.” 

“I need you, Cas.  I mean, we don’t have to do anything you don’t want, obviously, but I want to be with you.  Near you.” 

“You’ve been hurt so badly already tonight, Sam.”

“I don’t think you can.  I mean, physically.”  He caught Cas’ eyes.  “I’ve been given tonight for a reason.  Can we please enjoy it?” 

He paused and looked away.  “You’re going to die again.” 

“Maybe.  It depends.  I don’t… I don’t want to argue about it.  Not right now.  I just want to feel you near me.  Okay?” 

Cas paused.  “Okay,” he said finally, and he climbed into the bed beside Sam. 

Sam hesitated for a moment.  He’d made Cas feel bad – that wasn’t the goal.  He hadn’t wanted to blackmail him or pressure him, but now he could see that he’d upset him.  “I love you, Cas.  I want to be with you.” 

“Then why does whether or not you stick around ‘depend’ on anything?”  Cas’ head had been pillowed on his shoulder.  Now he pushed up a little and propped it up on his hands. 

“Because I can’t face more time like the past year,” he admitted quietly.  He explained God’s offer.  “So those are my options.  I can let my death be final and go to Heaven, be at peace.  Which, I have to admit, has a lot going for it.  Or I can take on Hell.”  He looked away.

Cas trailed a hand between his pecs.  “Do you have to go to Hell alone?”

“I suppose not.  I mean, God also said that I didn’t have to stay down there full-time.  He said I could travel freely between the planes.  I just kind of feel like I couldn’t do the job right if I didn’t spend enough time down there, keeping an eye on things and making them go right.”  He blinked.  “Did you just suggest what I think you suggested?”

“I believe that I’ve already shown that I’m willing to turn my back on Heaven for what’s right, Sam.  And what’s right is being with you.  I don’t think that it would mean that I’d no longer be an angel.  But I’m not willing to spend another day like the past year either.  And I’m not willing to lose you, either.” 

Sam rolled over onto his side.  “This is a huge step, Cas.”

“It is.  But it’s one that I’m willing to take.  For you and no one else.” 

Words failed Sam.  He reached out and kissed Castiel, trying to put everything he couldn’t voice into his mouth.  He must have done something right because Cas climbed right up on top of him, tongue and hands at the ready.  That night, for the first time, Cas topped and Sam lost himself completely in the sensation of completely enveloping his lover with his body.  Wherever they were, whatever hotel they were in, he hoped they didn’t have neighbors because he was not up for the noise complaints. 

He slept.  There was no dream discussion with the Almighty.  He simply woke in the morning, and felt the change.  Cas noticed right away, and his jaw dropped when he saw Sam.  “Hideous?” Sam asked. 

“Regal,” the angel reported.  “I doubt a regular human would even spot the difference.”  He kissed him and stroked his hair.  “I made a promise to your people, Sam.” 

He had.  The first person they told, though, was Dean.  He resisted at first.  “I just got you back, Sammy!  You don’t get to leave me again!”  But when Sam promised that they’d see each other regularly, and that Dean could call him anytime,  and that he didn’t really have much coice in the matter he reconciled himself to the change pretty quickly. 

Next all three of them went back to the abandoned house they’d been using as headquarters.  All of his people were gathered there, violating more fire codes than Sam could name off the top of his head and he could think of a lot of fire codes.  They stood to attention when they saw him, even the angels.  Meg, the most senior demon inasmuch as demons cared about hierarchy, bowed deeply.  “My King,” she intoned. 

“Princess,” he retorted before sobering.  He looked around at all the beings gathered around him, waiting for his orders.  This might’ve been the time for a long inaugurational speech, but Sam found he really wasn’t in the mood for it.  He kept it short and to the point.  “Look.  Heaven is broken.  That’s being dealt with.  Hell has its own problems.  Let’s deal with them together.  It’s time to go home.” 


End file.
